


The Overboss

by Josephi



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4, RWBY
Genre: Off-screen Rape
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-31
Updated: 2021-01-04
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:48:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 17
Words: 55,775
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25622389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Josephi/pseuds/Josephi
Summary: After a standard Synth reclamation mission goes wrong, the Nuka-World Overboss and some of his men are sent to Remnant, a world never ravaged by nuclear world. But soon they will know the wrath of the Overboss as he plunders and conquers this new world and claims new land in the name of the raiders.
Comments: 5
Kudos: 12





	1. A Mistake Made

Gage and a small group of raiders, three Disciples and three Operators, including Savoy, and a kidnapped local who seemed to know the area, were moving through the forest, coming up on their target. The target in question was a pre-war military bunker far to the north of the Commonwealth. They would’ve had a larger force of men, but the Overboss didn’t consider this a big enough concern to allocate those numbers.

The Overboss himself was currently at the Institute doing who knows what with the division heads. Turns out whoever was in charge of the SRB found out a rogue synth was hiding out in this old bunker. Despite the Railroad’s destruction, these bastards kept finding ways to escape. And since the bunker was outside the Commonwealth, and consequently the range of their Molecular Relay, the Overboss sent Gage and some raiders to track the synth down while the eggheads underground did some more research on the place. Eventually, they found the bunker entrance embedded in a small cliff face.

“Hold it.” He ordered the raiders to stop. It looked like all the other bunkers in the Commonwealth, with a solid concrete wall, no windows, and a rusted metal door. But this one didn’t seem to have any external defences. With normal people, that would’ve been reassuring, but his years of Raider experience caused him to be put off by this.

“Somethin’ ain’t right.” He motioned to one of the Operators. “You, go peek your head in there and see what there is.”

The raider sighed but obeyed, sneaking over to the door with his rifle raised. He lightly pressed the door, and was pleasantly surprised to find it unlocked. He opened it just enough for him to stick his head in, but was  _ un _ pleasantly surprised to find the place to be pitch black. He ran his hand along the wall and found a light switch. He flipped it, but nothing happened, and the lights remained off. He returned to Gage and informed him of what he saw.

“That’s gonna be an issue.” He turned to the rest of the group. “Alright, we’re gonna go in there and hunt down the synth bastard so we can all go back to the Commonwealth and get back to raiding. But while we’re in there, keep a sharp eye out for traps, and for God’s sake, don’t touch anything.”

With that, Gage and the group entered the bunker, wary of what they might find. They turned on the flashlights taped to their rifles, except the captive who didn’t have a flashlight, and entered the bunker. As they swept their lights across the room, they saw it was a security room, with multiple screening stations and desks. But what made them freeze was the walls being lined with dozens of occupied Protectron charging pods, and a few mag locked doors that undoubtedly held Assulatrons behind them.

“Ho-ly shit. Move slowly, and be careful.” Gage whispered. This was some serious security, and for all he knew, they had sound activation or something crazy like that. As they explored the large entry room, they found three doors. Two were regular blue metal doors that both led to bathrooms, but the last one was a large metal sliding door. It was a little stuck, but with help from Savoy, Gage was able to get it open. So far they hadn’t found any traps.

As they opened the door, it revealed a long dark hallway with no doors on either side. They flashed their lights further in and spotted a pair of heavy duty double doors on the opposite end of the hall. They were about to open those as well, but they were stopped by a blue flash and a loud bang. They all whipped around and illuminated what made the noise, and were all surprised to see a figure standing there. But upon further scrutiny, they realized it was the Overboss himself. His thick armor and terrifying mask along with the long metal blades welded to his armor were evidence enough of his identity.

“Boss, I thought you were busy dealin’ with the eggheads?” Gage questioned.

“I was.” He said, his deep voice resonating through the hall, sending shivers through one of the Operators. Gage had forgotten that not all the gang members had met the Overboss, at least not face-to-face. “They pulled up some info, and turns out this place has some powerful pre-war tech, though they don’t know what.” He started walking towards them, his large frame becoming more apparent as he got closer, his powerful rifle propped over his shoulder. “So I decided to come here personally.”

“Well, it’s a good thing you’re here, boss.” Savoy spoke up. Aside from Nisha, the Overboss seemed to be the only other person the mostly silent brute genuinely respected. “We have no idea what’s here, and we also have to babysit this bitch, since she seemed to know the place.” He gestured to the captive girl, and the Overboss turned his head to her. The only thing visible behind his mask was some of his black and scruffy beard, and his single, bloodshot eye. She shrank slightly under his silent gaze, before he turned his attention back to the door. He grabbed the handle and threw it open, clearly eager to see what was inside. “Just remember not to touch anything.” The Overboss reminded.

Inside to the left was a large platform with a large console, but only one terminal interface. To the right was a table holding about two dozen devices that looked like pulse grenades, each marked with the title “Emergency Return Device” and having a small battery bar on the side. And in the center was a machine that looked a lot like the Signal Interceptor the Overboss had built and used to initially get into the Institute, though three times as large and looking far less makeshift. The Overboss went up to it and examined it. The wiring was remarkably similar, and it looked to have the exact same purpose. The console on the platform most likely controlled it, but he didn’t see any kind of satellite dish anywhere in the room, so he wasn’t sure how it would receive signals.

Suddenly, the lights in the room turned on, temporarily blinding everyone. The sounds of pods opening and heavy metal footsteps echoed down the hall.

“Shit! Gage, get that door shut!” He yelled as he readied his rifle. Gage immediately slammed the door just in time to block some laser shots. He and one of the Disciples held the door shut. The Overboss looked up at the platform and saw the captive girl from before backing away from the terminal, a worried expression on her face. Then she saw him staring at her with murder in his eyes, and her face went pale. Before she could react, he vaulted over the console and grabbed her by the throat pinning her against the wall.

“You stupid fucking bitch, what did I tell you!?” He drew his combat knife and was about to stab her in the eye, when the Signal Interceptor burst to life, blue energy arcing from the device and hitting the floor and walls, leaving scorch marks. One arc hit one of the Operators and he vanished. He didn’t turn to ash, he completely disappeared. “God fucking dammit!” He tossed the girl off the platform. “Everyone, grab one of those devices and use them!” In a last ditch effort, each of the Raiders grabbed one, except Savoy, who grabbed two, leaving the door unblocked. But before they could use them, the Signal Interceptor look-a-like exploded, engulfing everyone in the room in a ball of blue energy, leaving nothing behind. The robots’ programming detected a lack of intruders, and so they returned to their pods, awaiting the moment more intruders arrived, the bunker power shutting itself down as they did.

**Some time later**

The Overboss awoke at the same time as everyone else, along with a splitting headache and in a rage. He stood up, shaking his head while growling and looking around. He saw the girl from before and began marching over to her. She tried to stand up and run, but he shot her in the knee, crippling her and making her scream in pain. He holstered his rifle and unsheathed his knife, this time not letting anything interrupt him. He grabbed her by the collar of her shirt and started stabbing her repeatedly in the abdomen, her cries for help becoming weaker as she lost blood. He finished her by slitting her throat, letting her blood splatter on him. He tossed her to the ground and stood up, aggressively wiping his blade on his pants and watching as she bled out on the ground.

“Uh, boss?” He heard Gage call behind him.

“What is it, Gage?!” He yelled, whipping around. He stopped when he saw what he was referring to. They were in a forest clearing, which wasn’t strange. What was strange was the fact that all the trees were lush and covered in thick green leaves. The Overboss was immediately hit with memories of pre-war America, and it took every fibre of his being to keep from looking shocked.

Not long after, a creature none of them had ever seen before burst out of the treeline and charged right at the Overboss. It looked like a werewolf but covered in pitch black fur and with bits of bone armor covering its body, most prominently it’s head. It was making a beeline right for him, almost like it was attracted to his rage. The Overboss simply lined up a shot and fired, the high powered bullet punching right through its skull. It went limp and started sliding along the ground, stopping right at his feet. He placed his boot on its head and put another round in it for good measure. Upon further inspection, he noticed a few other things. It’s eyes were glowing red, though the colour was rapidly draining. Along with that, it had a series of bone spikes all over its body. A row on each bicep and forearm, one single spike on each of its knees, and a long row running along its spine. He took his foot off once the creature started disintegrating, and that’s when he knew something was wrong.

“Where the hell are we?” He asked to no one in particular.

“I dunno boss, but it ain’t natural, that’s for damn sure.” Gage responded, unnerved by everything that had happened. The Overboss took out the “ERD” he, along with everyone else, had picked up. Savoy tossed one to the guy who had been hit before he had the chance to get one, him mumbling a ‘thanks’ as he caught it. He examined it, but was annoyed when he saw they were dead, the energy bar filling agonizingly slow. They would have to wait for them to recharge before they could be used. The Overboss pocketed his ERD before addressing the rest of the group.

“Let’s find a place to hold up in before we go looking around. None of us have any idea where we are, so don’t stray from the group, or I’ll leave you behind to get eaten by whatever that thing was.” With that, they decided to head in the opposite direction the beast came from to minimize the risk of running into more. As they walked, the Raiders looked around in hidden wonder, secretly amazed by the lush, life filled forest. None of them had ever seen a tree that didn’t look withered away before, although there were rumors of multiple places in America that had been left untouched by the war.

After an hour of walking in silence, they came across what appeared to be a town of some sort, though it looked like it had been attacked. It was surrounded by a wooden wall that was as tall as two men, but had a large hole blasted in it. They entered and the place looked ransacked, the streets strewn with dead settlers and burned out houses, some still alight.

“Now this looks more like it.” One of the Disciples said with a chuckle.

“Everyone spread out!” The Overboss ordered his men. “Look for survivors and supplies! Bring anything you find to me!” With that, everyone began looting a different house while the Overboss inspected the corpses. Some looked like soldiers and police officers, but they didn’t look like any he’d ever seen before. Quite a few even had animal traits, like wolf tails or cat ears. Upon closer inspection, they looked very natural.

“This doesn’t look like radiation.” He mumbled to himself. He drew his knife and cut off the ear of a wolf girl to bring back to the Institute, see if they could make any sense of it. A lot of the people had wallets that looked like the kind commonly used pre-war, but instead of caps, they were filled with these strange plastic cards. They said they were “Lien” and each card had a different colour and number, signifying different amounts. It was clearly currency, so he pocketed as much of this Lien as he could find.

After a few minutes, the sun was beginning to set.

“Hey boss, I found a survivor!” He heard behind him. He stood up from the corpse of a cop and turned around. He saw Savoy walking towards him with someone slung over his shoulder. When he reached him, he tossed the poor bastard onto the ground roughly, him groaning in pain while clutching his abdomen.

“Well well well, what do we have here?” He kneeled in front of the man who only stared at him defiantly. He had dirty brown hair with a clean shaven face and sharp green eyes. He didn’t look like anyone from the town. In fact, he looked like a Raider, with makeshift armor and everything. “And who might you be?”

“Fuck you.” He struggled out before spitting on his mask. He looked at him blankly before drawing his knife and casually planting it in his leg up to the hilt, as if he were simply putting it in a table. The man screamed in pain while clutching the area around the wound, but not the knife itself.

“Didn’t your whore mother tell you not to disrespect your betters? Now I’ll ask you again, who are you and what were you doing here?” He asked with more force, twisting the knife slightly.

“I-I was with the Branwen Tribe. We were raiding this place when some bastard got me good with a shotgun. They thought I was weak and left me to die.” The Overboss thought about this man’s explanation. So they weren’t the only Raiders around here? That wasn’t surprising, but he never liked competition. He reached into one of his pouches, the wounded raider flinching. That was good. People will obey when they’re afraid. He produced a Stimpak and showed it to him.

“Since your last outfit didn’t give two shits about you, how about you come with me? There’s way more of us where we came from, and I’ll give you a hit of this if you do.” He said, the man looking at the Stim with confusion.

“What the hell is that?” He asked. The Overboss just sighed before removing the knife and plunging the Stimpak right above it. He jerked in pain, but the red liquid started rapidly healing the wound, and he looked at it amazed. The boss chuckled.

“You want more?” He already knew the answer.

“Yeah sure.” He said with slight desperation. The blood loss was starting to get to him. He grabbed another Stim and stabbed him near the shotgun wound, the buckshot popping out and the wounds closing.

Nodding to Savoy, the large man hoisted the new blood up and supported him as he took him to the nearest intact house.

The Overboss turned to Gage, who had finished looking around. “How much food do we have here?”

“Enough to get by, for now at least.”

He nodded. “Set some food aside for him. Don’t worry about me, though.” He looked at the corpse he had been inspecting with hunger in his eyes. “I’ll make do on my own.” He kneeled down beside it and started using his knife to cut off chunks of flesh before eating them raw. Gage had a look of disgust, but knew better than to make his disgust known to the boss.

_ “I’ll never get used to him doing that.”  _ Gage thought to himself as he headed to the house the others had started using to store food.

**Meanwhile in the Commonwealth**

The Institute had already secured the bunker with the use of Synths. Dr. Li had gone there personally after the place had been cleared so she could inspect the device that had seemingly taken the group sent here. She didn’t like working with raiders, but the Nuka-World raiders were far too powerful by this point to take out. They had the manpower and the know-how to easily destroy the Institute, not to mention Father had chosen their leader,  _ his _ father, to be the next Director, not truely realizing the kind of man he was until it was too late.

Dr. Li was fascinated by the device. It had the same wiring and general internal structure as the Molecular Relay, but much more powerful. She estimated it was powerful enough to send people and objects off Earth. She went to the terminal and searched the data on it. It was still locked to the previous coordinates it had used, and was set to a location she didn't recognize. There were the coordinates followed by the name “Remnant.” If the name was put in, that meant the scientists working here had been there before, and knew what it was called.

Along with that, she was beyond relieved to find a complete, and highly detailed, copy of the blueprints to the machine. It was called the “IDT”, though it didn’t say what that meant. She copied the blueprints on a holotape and requested a relay back to the Institute. It was time to rebuild this machine, though this time with a few Institute improvements.


	2. The Fires Of War

“What the hell do you mean he’s fucking gone?!” Shouting could be heard from the Mayor’s Office in Diamond City. But, of course, it wasn’t the Mayor talking. That would be Mason, the Pack’s Alpha. During Overboss Cainen’s conquest of Nuka-World, he had gathered the gang leaders and told them what his plans for them were. He was planning on splitting four of the parks evenly between the Disciples and the Operators before giving the one remaining park to the Pack. And before Mason could get pissed at his lack of territory, the Overboss assured him he had another idea for the Pack, and that he would see what it was not long after they had taken the rest of Nuka-World.

And what an idea it was.

Almost immediately after Nuka-World had been taken, Cainen took a huge force of raiders and stormed Diamond City, taking the large settlement through superior firepower and numbers. And once things had settled down over there, Mason decided to move up there himself and live in the late Mayor McDonough’s office. And the bosses had figured out how to rig up some ham radios so they could communicate easier, so that wouldn’t be an issue.

The person Mason was currently yelling at was Cainen’s personal Courser, X6-88. It had been sent personally by the Institute to bring him the news.

“Director Cainen had decided to participate in the hunt for the rogue synth personally by temporarily overcharging the Molecular Relay so it could send him to Mr. Gage and his team. We lost contact with them shortly afterwards.” It explained in its monotone voice. “Their current whereabouts are unknown, but the records from the device discovered list a location known as Remnant.”

“Well, do you have any way of bringing him back?” He asked, very frustrated.

“Negative. We are beginning construction on a replica of the device that took the Director, and it will be completed in approximately three days.”

Mason sighed while pinching the bridge of his nose. “Of fucking course you don’t. Well, if that’s it, then get the hell outta my office.”

“There is one last thing. Dr. Ayo wants to know if you would like to be a part of the rescue team to be sent to this unknown location. The other gang bosses have been asked, but only Nisha has accepted the offer.”

Mason was slightly shocked by this. Normally, the eggheads underground never wanted anything to do with the raiders, which was understandable. But he wasn’t too surprised that Mags and William didn’t want to go. They were always too chicken shit to do anything themselves.

“Are you kidding me? Hell yeah I’ll go, I wanna see this place for myself and what it’s got in store.” He said, slight excitement in his voice.

The Courser nodded. “I will inform Dr. Ayo of your decision. We will contact you when the IDT has completed construction.” With that, X6-88 vanished from his office with a loud bang and a blue flash. Mason sighed for what felt like the hundredth time today and looked through the window out over Diamond City, now renamed “The Jungle.” His boys had done a good job redecorating the place with the corpses of the city’s previous guards, and the former Mayor’s head was mounted on his office door.

The “Wall” had once been a peaceful green, but was now covered from top to bottom in blood and paint. The settlers and traders that had been captured had shock collars put on them and were being forced to farm the crops, along with performing maintenance. Along with them, any merchants that came were informed of the change in leadership, with more than a few not caring and just wanting to know if they could still come and sell their wares. They were told to fuck off and go to Nuka-World.

One thing that seemed to piss off Cainen was the local detective, some old synth named Nick Valentine, escaping the city during the siege along with some girl, although the boss’s main target, a reporter named Piper, wasn’t so lucky. She was currently imprisoned at Fizztop Grille over in Nuka-World. He didn’t really know what Cainen did with her, but considering the state she was in the last time he had seen her and the fact the boss calls her his “personal slave”, he had a pretty good idea of what it was. Right then he heard a knock at the door.

“What the hell do you want?” He called. The door opened and one of the Scavvers with the bird masks walked in.

“Hey Mason, the slaves found something under your office while they were digging out an area for more cages.” He said.

“Well, what is it?” Mason asked, still a little frustrated.

“I dunno, it looks like some kinda room or something.” He said with a shrug.

**Meanwhile with Cainen**

So much had happened over the last couple hours. As soon as the shattered moon had risen, he and the rest of the raiders knew they weren’t on Earth. Cainen had been fiddling with his Pip-Boy in the largest of the intact houses, and discovered since coming here that some things had popped up under the Radio section. For one, he had dozens of new radio signals available to listen to, his favorite one so far being a station that played a type of music called “metal”. He had to get some copies of whatever they were playing, because it beat the hell out of all the music played in the Commonwealth. Along with that, the advanced technology of the Pip-Boy allowed him to tap into whatever signals were coming and going from the entire continent, apparently called Anima, whether they were public or private.

The second thing he noticed was a new tab under the Data section. It granted access to something called the “Internet”. It was like a terminal system, but covering the entire world. He had learned everything he needed to know about this new world not long afterwards just by looking things up. This “Aura” and “Semblance” business would benefit him greatly, but the only way to turn that stuff on was through high stress situations or having someone skilled in it activate it for you. Also, apparently that thing he had killed when they first arrived was a species of Grimm, a Beowolf to be exact. He figured Mason would like to have a few of them.

And the third and final thing related to his Pip-Boy were two new tabs under Radio. They were labelled “Messages” and “Calls”. They acted like terminal intra-mail and telephones, respectively, but with much farther range. There was also the option to “add” the nearest Pip-Boy to the contact list, or put in a Scroll/phone number. Cainen had already been planning on finding some Pip-Boys for the other higher ups in the gangs, but this just put that higher up on the priority list.

One not so good thing was the discovery that the ERDs could only recharge on their own so far before needing new batteries. So they were effectively stranded here until they found a new way to charge them, likely by using lightning Dust. He was brought out of his concentration by someone knocking on the door to the old garage he was in.

“Enter.” He ordered. The door opened and in came Gage, looking like he had just been in a fight. “Did someone attack?” He asked, giving him most of his attention.

“Nah.” Gage said with a chuckle. “We were out huntin’ for food when we were attacked by a group of those Hunstmen you told us about earlier. We thought we were dead, but our bullets ripped right through their Auras. Neither of us expected that, but we recovered faster. We killed em and took one prisoner.”

“Bring him to me.” He ordered, glancing at the chair in the corner. “I’ll get prepared in the meantime.” He said with a dark tone. He wanted to test something

“You got it, boss.” Gage left, immediately knowing what was about to go down.

About an hour later, Cainen had the Hunstman, who just looked like a kid, sitting in front of him tied to a chair in the dark garage, with only a candle beneath them to illuminate the two. He had blonde hair that had once been clean, but was now dirty and disheveled. He was shirtless and in a pair of torn jeans with a golden monkey tail sticking out of the back, revealing the damage he’d received during the fight. The only real one, aside from a few cuts and bruises, was a bandaged gunshot wound to his side.

The boy slowly woke up, groaning in pain. He tried to move, but was still a little woozy. That all went away when he looked up and saw the visage of Cainen staring at him, his single, bloodshot eye boring into his soul, made even more terrifying by the shadows from the candle.

“Who are you, and what were you and your little team doing in  _ my _ forest, attacking  _ my _ boys?” He ordered, his voice low and harsh.

“Wh-where are my friends? What did you do to them?!” He yelled, struggling against his restraints. The memory of his friends being gunned down in front of him were coming back to him.

Not saying a word, Cainen raised his hands to reveal the two knives he was holding. One was his personal combat knife that he’d found deep in the Glowing Sea and had been exposed to radiation for a long time.. The second was a brand new, clean knife he’d found in the kitchen of the house. He flipped them around in a reverse grip before stabbing them both into the boy’s thighs. The kitchen knife bounced off his Aura harmlessly, as expected, but the wasteland blade went right through, burying in his thigh. He screamed in pain and started breathing hard, the burning of the dirt and filth no doubt intensifying it.

This confirmed Cainen’s theory. Radiation seemed to completely nullify Aura, which explained why the raiders’s bullets were able to rip through them so easily. The munitions they used had been around so long almost all of it was either pre-war and had been through the nukes or had been made long enough ago that it had been exposed to some amount of radiation at some point.

“I know you heard me, animal, as I haven’t severed your ears yet. I won’t ask again.” He said, twisting the combat knife slightly.

“Ok ok, just stop, please!” He borderline cried for mercy. Cainen stopped twisting, but didn’t take the knife out. After breathing for a moment, he started talking. “Headmaster Lionheart found out about you guys and told me and my team to go take you guys down. Y’know, to nip the problem in the bud. We thought you were a rogue branch of the Branwen Tribe.” So, these guys were students. And their Headmaster underestimated them to the point that he sent literal children to take him down? That wouldn’t stand. He was the Overboss of Nuka-World for fuck’s sake! He was about to just kill the kid when he remembered something he read when researching Aura activation.

“What’s your name?” He asked, his tone the same.

“Sun. Sun Wukong.” He struggled out. That name. It was a very Asian name, and that angered him.  _ Do the fucking Reds have a foothold everywhere? _

“Well, Sun, it’s your lucky day. I’m in a good mood.” He harshly removed the combat knife from Neptune’s thigh, eliciting a wince. “I’ll make you a deal. You’ll unlock my Aura, and subsequently my Semblance, and I won’t string you up like a sadistic scarecrow for everyone to see.”

After a moment of consideration, he nodded, just wanting this torture to end. Cainen reached around and cut the restraints to his right hand. He then leaned back in his chair, subconsciously telling Sun to do it. He placed his hand on his chest, the cold, dirty metal making him shiver slightly, before reciting the chant.

“For it is in passing that we achieve immortality.” He recited with a shaky voice. Golden energy started going from his arm into Cainen’s chest. However, as soon as it made contact, it seemed to corrupt and turn black, sucking into his heart. It burned. Sun continued. “Through this, we become a paragon of virtue and glory to rise above all.” Cainen would’ve snickered at that, but he was distracted by the worst case of heartburn in his life as the energy intensified, illuminating the garage. “Infinite in distance and unbound by death, I release your soul, and by my shoulder, protect thee.”

With those final words, Cainen was sent flying backwards, his entire body feeling like it was on fire. He leaned against the wall as embers and ash began to swirl off of him. His hands started glowing like fire, and he held his abdomen as he felt like he was about to vomit. He suddenly stood straight up, roaring at the ceiling with jets of flame streaming out of his mouth and hands, though his mask remained unaffected. The intensity of the heat melted holes through the ceiling, bursting into the room above. He regained control and looked at his hands, amazed by the flames. Ash and cinders continued to be produced by his body, swirling about. He looked up at Sun with a demonic smile stretched across his face, and began walking towards him with a hand outstretched. The kid knew he’d made a mistake.

“W-wait, no! You said you wouldn’t kill me, please!” He cried in desperation, tugging at his other restraint with no success.

“Oh, I said I wouldn’t string you up.” As he spoke, Sun could see flames licking up from the back of his throat like a furnace, ready to be released. “I didn’t say anything about immolation!” He yelled before grabbing him by the sides of his head and breathing flames into his face. He screamed in pain as he was burned to a crisp, turning him into a blackened corpse within seconds, surrounded by the ashes of the chair he had been bound to. Cainen let go of the body, letting it crumple to the floor.

As he panted, he realized the visual effects of his Semblance, the flaming hands and the ashes and embers, weren’t going away. That was fine, though. It just made him more intimidating.

“Probably should’ve made him do Gage and Savoy.” He realized. “Ah well.” He shrugged and left, intent on informing the rest of the gang of this new “development”. As he walked, he remembered reading that it was tradition to name your Semblance. He had no idea why, but he didn’t really care. He thought for a moment, before coming up with one.

Cainen now wielded the Fires of War, and with them, he would reduce those stupid enough to stand against him to ash and burned flesh.


	3. Remnant Raider Radio

Things had been progressing nicely over the last couple days for the Remnant Raiders, as Cainen had decided to call this branch. After demonstrating the Fires Of War to his men, the Raiders were more excited than ever. They now had two primary orders from him. Build up the ruins of this town into a new outpost for them, and capture any travelers that strayed to close, especially Huntsmen. If they had their hands on a Huntsman, Cainen could “convince” them to activate Gage’s and Savoy’s Auras. Then they’d be a true force to be reckoned with.

Another thing was earlier that day, when Cainen was performing some target practice on some Grimm that had gotten too close, he discovered he could imbue his rifle, the Problem Solver, with Fires, causing his bullets to explode on impact. It wasn’t a big explosion, but it was enough to shred an Alpha Beowolf into charred chunks within seconds. But it was only temporary because if he imbued it for too long, he risked damaging his prized weapon, and that wasn’t acceptable. After some further experimentation, he deduced he could imbue his weapon for around ten minutes before the Fires started to burn it.

As he walked through the newly named Stronghold, he was pleased to see his men hard at work building fortifications. They had used the spare material from the destroyed houses to build smaller, more ramshackle ones that would serve them well, as well as line the walls with barbed wire. There were enough intact houses for them all to live in one, or share a few, but the shacks were for when they figured out how to get more raiders here. They had also patched up the large hole at the back of the outpost with metal and covered it in barbed wire. They had wanted to coat the wire with some kind of poison for good measure, but they didn’t have access to anything like that, so they’d have to wait. Some of the Operators had even started claiming abandoned stores as their own, in preparation for when they had stuff to sell, while the Disciples gave the Stronghold that signature raider look with the bodies of the previous inhabitants. And with the Grimm running around, Cainen figured Mason and the rest of the Pack would have a hell of a time capturing and taming them, if they could.

Cainen reached the main gate, which had been repaired quite a bit, and ascended the stairs to one of the guard towers. The Disciple stationed there turned around at the sound of his heavy boots hitting the wooden steps, and was surprised to see him.

“Oh, Overboss! I didn’t know you were coming up here. What do you need?” She asked. Cainen remained silent until he reached the top. He rested his hands on the edge of the tower and looked out over the forest. The Disciple coughed a little from his smoke.

“Have you seen any travelers at all?” He asked.

“Well, a group of people with a truck full of something came up the road, but turned around and got the hell outta dodge as soon as they saw us.” She pointed to the dirt road linking the gate to the treeline. Upon closer inspection, he could see the large tire tracks in the dirt, and it did look like they’d turned around. “We would’ve chased them, but no one knows how to drive a car, and there’s no way we could’ve given chase on foot.”

That was another thing he had to do. He had to teach at least one person how to drive, then get them to teach the others. It would make travel infinitely easier and safer, not to mention it would make raiding easier.

Without another word, he left the tower and began walking over to the market area. He was sure to find one of the Operators over there. After a bit of searching, he found one in one of the stores. He was rummaging around in the storage room, grumbling about Lien and how stupid plastic cards were. Cainen leaned on the counter and cleared his throat, getting his attention.

“Yeah, I’ll be out in a minute!” After a moment, he exited the room and came out behind the counter. “Hey boss, what do you need?”

“I’m going to teach you how to drive a car, then I need you to teach the others.” He said plainly. The Operator was surprised by this, and he raised an eyebrow.

“How do you know how to drive?”

Cainen narrowed his eyes at him. “Are you questioning me?” His tone was darker, and the embers intensified slightly. Realizing his mistake, the Operator backed up a step while raising his hands.

“No boss, not from me. So, uh, when’ll you be teaching me?”

“Right now.” He got off the counter and began walking out, beckoning for the Operator to follow. “Come with me.”

**Meanwhile in the Commonwealth**

Nisha relayed into the Institute alongside X6-88, her having to hide the queasiness she felt from the teleportation. She didn’t understand how Cainen did it so often without any nausea, at least that she knew of. Dixie would’ve come as well, but she was busy doing something with Lizzie and the Operators. When asked, she just said it was a “surprise”, and not to worry about it. She’d ask again when they got back.

They had teleported right in the middle of the common area, so she didn’t get the cinematic view from the elevator. She looked around briefly, and didn’t like how smooth and clean everything looked. She had once asked Cainen why he never invaded the Institute and took it for themselves, and he said it was because “We were barely able to get the Nuka-World Power Plant up and running. You think any of us would know how to properly maintain tech that advanced?” She understood that point pretty well.

“Right this way, ma’am.” The Courser led her to an area off of the main atrium, and into what looked like a storage room. Within there was an old looking elevator. They entered the elevator and X6-88 hit the button for the lowest floor.

“Is the teleporter ready?” Nisha asked as they went down. The ride was much smoother than she thought it would be.

“Affirmative.” He nodded and answered without looking at her. “The scientists are running some final diagnostics on the IDT and preparing it for use.”

“This better actually work. I’d rather not get sent to the moon or the middle of space”

“The scientists have run a number of experiments. All synths, barring the first, returned alive, a few with minor injuries.”

“And what happened to the first one?” Nisha was still skeptical about this.

“A wild animal attack, confirming the theory that Remnant can support life.”

The ride continued in silence until the elevator came to a stop. The doors opened, and she was met by more sterile white walls and advanced tech. Upon exiting the elevator, she noticed this was the control room. On the left wall was a long glass window with multiple consoles and terminals in front of it, all connected to the teleporter. Through the window, she could see the teleporter itself. It was large and looked nothing like the one that had been in the bunker. It consisted of two semi-circles with a platform built into the floor between them. All of the wiring was covered by more white casing, with only blue lights on the inside of the rings being visible. On the right wall was what looked like a waiting room, with a large number of chairs against the wall. And occupying those seats were Mason and several of his guys, along with someone who looked like a raider, but not one she recognized.

“Good, you’re here just in time.” She heard someone call. She looked over at the consoles and she saw one of the scientists coming over to her. She wore a white lab coat with a blue streak along it. She seemed fairly old with graying hair, and looked to be of Asian descent.

“I’m Dr. Madison Li, head of Advanced Systems and the creator of the IDT. I’d shake your hand, but knowing you, they’ve probably been in someone’s chest recently.” She said without a hint of sarcasm.

“You’re not wrong. And if you aren’t careful, they’ll end up in yours.” Nisha fired back. Before they could continue, one of the other scientists interrupted.

“Can you two stop arguing? The IDT is ready, and I’d like to get this over with.” The scientist in question was wearing a full hazmat suit with their face covered. Before Nisha could ask who he was, he interrupted. “You don’t need to know my name, all you need to know is I’ll be going with you to collect samples for later experimentation.”

Nisha snarled a little. She hated babysitting. “Fine, but don’t get in our way.” He reached behind him and drew a plasma rifle she didn’t know was there.

“I can handle myself in a fight. If all goes well, you’ll barely know I’m there.” He reassured her before going out into the teleporter room.

“It’s about time you got here, it’s been boring as hell waiting.” Mason said as he and the rest of the Pack approached the two. They looked like they were getting antsy.

“Who’s this?” She asked, pointing to the new addition.

Mason just chuckled. “You’ll find out when we find the boss.” He said with a grin. She just sighed.

“If you all will follow me, we’ll start up the IDT.” Li said before walking over to the door to the teleporter room. She opened it and the raiders went in, while the door shut behind them. The synth technicians had cleared out, so it was only them and the scientist that would be going with them.

“Alright, starting up the device now.” Li said over the intercom. “Instead of a flash, like the relay or the old IDT, this one opens a stable portal that you can walk through. It’ll feel a little weird, but most of you handled relaying here pretty well, so I’m confident you won’t pass out.”

“Hey, try not to throw up again.” One of the Pack chuckled and nudged his buddy, who just groaned in defeat.

The blue lights began to glow brighter and brighter until the entire room was flooded in blue light. One by one they fully powered up, shooting a blue beam into the central area, causing a ball to form that slowly grew. Eventually that ball grew to the size of a delivery truck and only the outer and a bit of the inner edge was blue, the rest being pitch black.

“The portal is ready, you can go through whenever you want. We’ll close it once everyone’s through, then we’ll reopen it two days later.” Li confirmed.

“Let’s fucking go!” One of the Pack shouted before running through the portal, disappearing in its grasp. The other Pack, emboldened by their comrade’s actions, charged in as well, going in with the same energy as if they were going on a raid.

As they emerged from the other side, they stopped in wonder at the forest, but they weren't there long, as they heard gunshots in the distance. The scientist was only able to collect one leaf before being forced to follow them so as not to get left behind, his plasma rifle drawn. This was already getting intense.

**At the Stronghold**

A pair of Disciples were taking pot shots at some Grimm that had shown up at the gate. It was only a small pack, and they couldn't scale the wall, so the two felt they were safe. The group was eliminated, with their corpses beginning to disintegrate, and they were about to set their rifles down and relax, when they heard shouting in the forest. They immediately got ready to shoot again, but when their supposed assailants broke through the treeline, they could see it was Mason, Nisha and a bunch of Pack members, along with an Institute scientist, of all things. They stopped and they stared at each other in shock for a moment before Mason spoke up.

“Holy shit, you guys seem to be doing well for yourselves!” Mason yelled over the walls.

“Mason?! Nisha?! How the hell did you guys get here?!” One of the guards called back.

“We’ll explain in a bit, where’s Cainen?” Nisha asked, her tone as cool as ever.

“I’ll go get him while he opens the gate.” The guard on the right disappeared off the tower while the guard on the left pressed a button next to him, causing the gates to start opening. They were heavy and slow, but the doors retracted into the walls, allowing passage. They went through, and the gate closed behind them.

“Well, look who it is!” They heard, followed by a laugh. “Welcome to Remnant!” Mason looked at the nearest house and was further surprised to see Gage walking out, his rifle slung over his back.

“This isn’t as bad as I’d thought it’d be. I see my crew have spiced the place up.” Nisha complimented, seeming impressed by it, all things considered.

“Shit, you must’ve given these poor bastards hell.” Mason said with a chuckle.

“Actually, they’d already been wiped out by another gang, the Branwen Tribe, or some bullshit like that.” He then noticed some people were missing. “Hey, where’s Mag and William? Figured they’d want to see how their boys were doing.”

Mason scowled. “They pussied out. Didn’t want to risk their lives until they knew it was safe.”

Gage frowned. The Operators here wouldn’t be happy to hear that. “Well, I’ll bring you to the boss’s place. He’ll be glad to see you.”

The Pack were dismissed to go do whatever while Gage took Mason and Nisha to Cainan’s place. As they walked, Gage filled them in on some stuff, like Aura and Semblances. Mason was, expectedly, really interested in the Grimm. Even when told that they couldn’t be tamed, he just took it as a challenge.

“Oh, one last thing.” He stopped them before opening the door to his place. “The boss has gone through some… physical changes over the last while, so don’t freak out when you see him.” The two bosses just looked at him, Mason with a raised eyebrow, before Gage opened the door and let them in. Cainen had never bothered to get rid of Colter’s old decorations at Fizztop, so they weren’t expecting to see the walls lined with various melee weapons. They ranged from swords to axes to even a couple warhammers.

“Yeah, ever since he unlocked his Semblance, the boss has really gotten into blacksmithin’, though I can see why.

They sat down on chairs, avoiding the couch, in the living room, which looked untouched except for all the weapons, and realized they could hear clanging in the garage. Gage called for him, and the clanging stopped. After a moment, the door opened at the opposite side of the wall opened, and they were both shocked to see him. He was out of his armor and was now wearing a pair of green camo pants and a white tank top. He was still wearing his helmet, but it had been recoloured a variety of orange, red and black to match the Fires Of War.

“I’m guessing the Institute’s involved with your arrival?” He spoke as he sat down on the couch, them catching glimpses of the flames in his throat.

“Damn, I figured Semblances were powerful and all from what Gage said, but I didn’t know they made you look more badass than you already did. That’s a serious upgrade.” Mason said with a laugh. “And yeah, they remade the teleporter and sent us through. Said they’d reopen it in two days.”

Cainen opened his hand and a flame came out, burning on his palm but not hurting him. “Upgrade is an understatement.” He said with a grin before he clenched his fist and put out the flame. “The Fires Of War will bring any towns that don’t want to play nice to their knees.”

“While we’re on the topic, I’m assuming you know how to unlock these things?” Nisha asked, secretly excited to see what Semblance she would get.

“And  _ I’m _ assuming Gage filled you guys in on what Aura and Semblances are?” Gage nodded, and Cainen grunted in approval before continuing. “From what I’ve learned, there are two ways to unlock that stuff. The first is through stressful combat situations where your life is at risk, like a last minute ‘fuck you’ to whoever or whatever is trying to kill you. But that method doesn’t always work.” The bosses nodded in understanding. “The second, surefire way to get it is to have a skilled Aura user unlock it for you. It was how I unlocked mine, but while I was riding the high, I turned the fucker into a charred corpse. So if you guys want to go with that method, you’ll have to get some of your guys to capture at least one Huntsman or Huntress. They’re Grimm killers skilled with Aura, so they’ll be able to do it no problem.”

Mason had a look on his face. “But, uh, how the hell are we supposed to nab one of those super-powered assholes?” Cainen grinned at that.

“That brings us to our next topic. During these last few days, we discovered that stuff that’s been exposed to radiation can completely nullify Aura. We first discovered it when a group of our guys were ambushed by a team of Huntsmen while they were out hunting, but they mowed them down pretty easily. We captured their leader, and you know the rest.” He explained. “If you want to know more, you can ask Savoy. I’m sure one of the Disciples knows where he is right now.”

“Well, if that’s it, I got someone I wanna introduce you to.” Mason said as he stood up and left the house.

“Then take me to him.” Cainen said, following.

They walked over to the front gate where some of the Pack were gathering scrap metal to build cages and other things. But what caught Cainen’s eye was Savoy talking to someone whom he assumed to be this new guy. They approached, and the two ended their conversation, Savoy taking a post at the gate and the new guy coming towards them.

“Boss, this is Power Wolf.” Power Wolf was almost as big as Cainen, and was wearing a black t-shirt with the Pack symbol spray painted on, but it was red instead of purple, along with wearing a pair of blue jeans. He had black fingerless gloves and wore a gas mask with tinted goggles, his long dark hair hanging messily. He smelled strongly of gasoline.

“Pleasure meeting you, Overboss.” He said. His voice was deep but smooth at the same time. He gave off vibes that he was chill but would fuck you up badly if you pissed him off.

“He’s here because he’s got a special offer for you.” Mason said with a grin, motioning for Power Wolf to continue.

He nodded. “Yeah, I’ll get right to the point. I’m an ex-Rust Devil, so I’m offering to make you a Sentry Bot based on Ahab, but with a few upgrades. And, at the same time, since I noticed this place has a radio station, I was hoping you’d be cool with me getting it up and running and turning it into the next Raider Radio. But instead of Red Eye, it’ll be me.”

Cainen thought about it for a minute. A personal Sentry Bot sounded great, and getting a new version of Raider Radio set up here would attract new recruits and make the guys happy. He quickly made his decision.

“Alright, get the station up and running, then once it’s playing music on its own, get to work on my robot.” Cainen ordered.

“You got it, boss.” Power Wolf nodded, then made his way over to the radio station and got to work setting it up. With that, Cainen took Mason to show him where he’d be staying while waiting for the Institute to reopen the portal.

**A few hours later**

Power Wolf sat in the studio, a load of music, specifically metal, loaded in the player. Something he discovered while getting the place up and running was that the station was also connected to the CCT Tower in Mistral, allowing him to broadcast all over Anima, but not Remnant as a whole. He pulled his chair up to the mic and turned it on.

“Welcome, crazy bastards of all kinds, to Raider Radio.” His tone was far more relaxed than Red Eye’s, which would be in sharp contrast to the music.

“I’m your host, Power Wolf, and this is your one-stop-shop for all your favorite music and news regarding the Remnant Raiders. Now, I know most of you are used to Red Eye and his less than stellar guitar tracks, but worry not. I’m not afraid to say I’m shit at instruments, and sure as shit ain’t singing. I’ll just be playing whatever metal tracks I can get my hands one, which, at this time, is quite a few. But first, some news.

“Now, for any of you that haven’t heard, Mason and Nisha, leaders of the Pack and Disciples respectively, have finally made it to our little home away from home. Mags and William may not be here, but someone’s gotta stay home and run everything, right? Anyway, Overboss Cainen has also put out a bounty for Huntsmen, but he only wants one, and he wants them alive. He’s offering a sum of a thousand Lien to the first person that can bring him one intact and breathing, so you know what to do. And finally, the Overboss has appointed Wilson of the Operators as the guy to teach you psychos how to drive, so go to him if you want to be a designated driver. You’ll get to do supply deliveries and bring our guys to raids, so that’ll be fun.

“And that’s all the news I have for now. The first song on our list is Dead Black (Heart of Ice) by Soul Remnants. Beyond that, well, it's a mystery, isn’t it? Just sit back, relax, and let the riffs take you.” With that, he turned off the mic and hit play on the music player. He put on the wireless headphones he’d found and listened to the song while he went downstairs to his makeshift garage to work on Cainen’s personal Sentry Bot.


	4. The Bird's Folly

Cainen tuned the truck radio to Raider Radio as he drove to his next destination. It had been a few days since Mason and Nisha arrived, and the raiders had found a large delivery truck locked in the delivery depot of the Stronghold and took it as their own. They had covered it in all sorts of “decorations” ranging from skulls, both animal and human, to painted symbols, and even barbed wire along the edges of the truck. Power Wolf had also installed some improvements, such as armored parts and a more powerful engine, effectively turning the truck into a battering ram.

As it rumbled along the dirt road, he absentmindedly ran an Ursa down, the truck barely flinching at the impact. Since they had fully fortified the Stronghold, he had decided it was time to branch out. They had originally considered doing what they normally did in the Commonwealth. Go to a settlement and beat, scare or, if all else fails, enslave the inhabitants into supplying them. But, since he found out the Grimm were attracted to negative emotions like Bloodbugs to a lone Brahmin, those wouldn't be viable options, not unless they wanted to lose their meal ticket not long after getting it. And after consulting with his underbosses, he found a solution. He’d make the nearby settlements a deal. The settlers would cough up supplies and Lien in exchange for the raiders’ protection from whatever threats they may face, or they would be wiped out and their settlement would be used to create a new outpost for the raiders.

He was currently delivering their “negotiation” squad to the nearest farm, some place called the Reinhardt Family Farms. Poor place only had a run-down wall surrounding it for protection. The squad consisted of Gage, who was, undoubtedly, the most diplomatic out of all of them, along with about eight other raiders, mostly Pack with a few Disciples. They had been ordered not to harm any of the settlers if they agreed, as that would be biting the hand that fed you. The punishment for doing so was death by immolation.

They arrived at the farm by noon, driving right through the broken down gate. As they pulled up, the farmers noticed and fled the fields, taking shelter in the farmhouse and barn. He honked the horn, also modified to be lower in pitch, to inform everyone of their arrival. Cainen stopped the truck in front of the farmhouse and he heard the storage compartment door behind him open, along with boots hitting the ground. The guys started walking toward the house, their rifles held in a non-threatening way.

“Come on out! We just wanna talk!” Gage shouted. The front door opened and a slightly muscled woman came out, wielding a double barreled shotgun. She was wearing a blue shirt with black jeans and had long red hair. She had a mean look on her face, and he got the feeling she’d fought off Grimm before.

“What the hell do you bastards want with us?!” She yelled with her shotgun raised. She looked like she’d been raised in the country, but talked like she was from the city. She glanced at the windshield of the truck, but couldn’t see him due to the tinted windows.

“Easy there, sweetheart, we have a proposition for you.” Gage calmed her down, his rifle pointed at the ground. She lowered her shotgun but kept her finger on the trigger. “That's more like it. Now, I’m sure you’ve heard of the Remnant Raiders, what with our radio station and whatnot, so I’ll skip past the introductions. We’re here to offer you our protection in exchange for deliveries of supplies and Lien every other week.”

She snarled at that. “Or what? My dad taught me how to use a gun effectively, and I’ve taken down tougher assholes than you.”

“Oh, I don’t doubt that for a second, Ms?” Gage paused, waiting for her to answer.

“Reinhardt. Auburn Reinhardt.” Gage mentally scoffed at the name.

_ What is with these people and colour based names? _

“Well, Auburn, I’m sure you’ve taken down plenty of punks with guns, but have you ever taken on an Aura User?” He asked with a devilish grin. That was Cainen’s signal. He shut off the truck’s engine and exited the large vehicle. As soon as she got a good look at him, her face went white as she realized just who he was. To make things worse, the glow in his throat had spread to his eyes, giving him an even more demonic appearance. She pointed her shotgun at him, her aim shaky and her hands sweaty.

“D-don’t come any closer!” She threatened, her voice soaked with fear. That was good. People are more willing to obey when they’re pissing themselves.

“Put your gun on the ground or I’ll brand you with its barrels.” He snarled at her. He was getting impatient. She tossed it to the ground and put her hands up, practically shaking. He got right up in her face, him looking down on her due to him being a head taller.

“You’re gonna accept our gracious offer, or I’ll butcher each and every one of you, claim this shitty little farm for the raiders, and mail your skulls to all the other settlements as a warning.” He said, his voice low and dangerous, the smoke coming off him practically suffocating her.

“Ok, ok! We’ll give you whatever you want, just make sure your guys don’t hurt us.” She finally caved. He backed off, still staring at her, before turning to address his men.

“Alright! Take up guard posts on the walls and shoot anything that doesn’t look friendly! And if I hear any of you are fucking with the farmers, I’ll personally severe your legs and leave you in the forest for the Grimm.” With that, Cainen and Gage got back in the truck and the raiders went to the wall to uphold their end of the bargain. Cainen started up the large vehicle and turned on the radio just in time to catch Power Wolf’s news bit.

“Welcome, one and all, to Remnant Raider Radio. I don’t have any news that most of you don’t already know about, so I’ll just get right back to the music. The next track is Sanctified With Dynamite by, funnily enough, the band Powerwolf. I swear I didn’t know about them before, I only learned about them when someone came in with a crate full of their tracks.” He said with a chuckle, before he cut out and the music cut in.

Right then, Cainen got a message from Mason on his Pip-Boy, sent from the new Scroll he’d set him up with. All it said was that there was a surprise for him back at the Stronghold. He didn’t like it when people kept secrets from him, but he believed the Pack Alpha had no malicious intentions with this. Gage rolled down his window and lit up a cigarette, the window being to vent both his smoke and Cainen’s. Little did they know their truck was being watched by someone from a bird’s eye view who was very much interested in Cainen’s exploits across Anima.

**At the Stronghold**

Cainen walked into Mason’s house, hearing something in the living room. He walked in and saw Mason standing on a stool in front of the fireplace, busy screwing a large moose skull into the chimney wall. Cainen waited a few seconds before coughing to get his attention. He turned around and grinned when he saw him.

“Oh good, you’re back. I got something to show you.” He hopped off his stool, leaving the drill on the mantelpiece, and beckoned him to follow as he went outside. He led him to a garage at the old supply depot that had been previously cleaned out. Mason chuckled before hitting the red button to open the door, and revealed his surprise. It was a small metal platform with a console interface facing towards them. It only seemed to have a medium generator hooked up to it.

“Ta-da! We convinced your Institute guys to build another IDT at Nuka-World with a permanent link between here and there. And since this is only a receiving platform, it doesn't need nearly as much juice as the full thing.” Mason explained proudly. Cainen raised an eyebrow in surprise. He had organized all this without his knowledge? That unnerved him a little, but that was just his paranoia talking. He was genuinely impressed by this. Now they could get a stream of goods to the Stronghold and they could open the market.

“Nice work, but don’t keep secrets from me next time. Secrets make me suspicious.” He complimented Mason.

“No problem boss. We’ve already got supplies in like guns and ammo, so we’re waiting on your go ahead for Power Wolf to let out a news broadcast announcing the market’s open for business.” Cainen liked this very much. Now they’d have a steady supply of Lien as word of their market spread.

“Yeah, go on ahead. Just make sure he makes the rules clear. Traders won't be harmed as long as they’re here on business and don’t go anywhere except the market.”

“Got it boss. I’ll go tell him right away.” Mason left in the direction of the radio station while Cainen stayed and stared at the platform for a moment. His curiosity got the better of him and he went up to the interface.

He turned on the terminal and looked through the options. There were only two, “Request Portal” and “Emergency Shutdown”. Easy and simple to understand. He was confident even a complete dumbass would be able to use it properly. He shut off the terminal and walked back to his home, intent on using some of the scrap metal they’d gotten from Nuka-World to make more weapons. Hell, maybe he’d humor the merchant life and open a shop of his own where he’d sell custom melee weapons. He could see the shop name already, “Cainen’s Hell-Forged Weaponry”. Now that’d be interesting.

As he neared his house, he heard a crow squawk before landing on his roof, staring at him. He stared back, mildly suspicious of the corvid, but ultimately ignored it and went inside. He removed his armor and hung it on the hooks next to the door, while putting his helmet on a special stand, leaving him in his shirt and jeans. He walked through the halls to the kitchen and opened the fridge, grabbing a bottle of unnamed Vodka. He scratched his bald head before grabbing a Brahmin steak as well. As he looked at the bottle, he saw his reflection. It seemed the glow was spreading like a disease, but it just made him feel stronger. The glow in his eyes, throat and hands were starting to get to his veins. It was especially prominent around his eyes, his whites now turning a burning orange and the veins around them looking like hot spiderwebs.

He shook his head and went into the living room, deciding to listen to the radio and relax instead of forge. But he was stopped short by something. Out of his peripheral vision, he saw the door to his garage was wide open and the light was on. He always kept it shut when he wasn’t using it. That meant someone was in there.

He silently donned his helmet and grabbed the Problem Solver from the fireplace mantlepiece, then entered the garage with his rifle raised. Inside, he saw everything was in place except for a woman leaning against the garage door. She wore a mask similar to a White Fang mask but much larger and had long dark hair, along with pale skin. On her hip was a sword with a strange sheath. She looked up at him, staring right down the barrel of his gun.

“You have ten seconds to explain who you are and why you’re here. The length of your death is entirely dependent on your answer.”

She stayed silent for a moment before speaking. “You should really close your windows.” She said, her smirk practically audible. Cainen put two and two together and realized she must’ve been the bird he saw, that being her Semblance. Not in the mood to play verbal cat and mouse with her, he slowly lowered his rifle while feigning confusion, but once his barrel was in position, he pulled the trigger and shot her in the kneecap. She collapsed to the ground yelling in pain and clutching her leg, clearly not expecting it to go through her Aura. Hidden advantages were the best kind.

He slung his rifle on his back and drew his knife while approaching her, hearing her mutter “What the hell was that?!”. He kicked her in the head, knocking her mask off. She was beautiful underneath, but he was too pissed to give a shit. He kneeled over her, pinning her to the ground under his weight, and held his knife to her face. She snarled, then winced in pain from the gunshot wound. The Fires of War were really flaring now, with small bursts of flame coming from between his clenched teeth with every breath.

“I’d hate to ruin that pretty face of yours, but if you don’t answer my questions, I’m gonna carve it up and hand you over to my boys to play with.” He threatened, placing the cold tip of the blade on her cheek. She looked into his eyes, but instead of the lust that was normally there when men saw her, she saw only rage and hatred. She didn’t know what kind of ammo this psycho used, but she had no idea they could puncture Aura like that.

“I’m the leader of the Branwen Tribe, and I was hoping you’d take the easy route and merge your gang with mine.” She said through clenched teeth. He looked surprised for a moment, and she was about to kick him off her, when he shocked her by bursting out laughing.

“Of course you’d ask that, the smaller fish always want what they haven’t earned.” He slashed her cheek, but she fought back a cry of pain. “You really think we’d ally ourselves with you? Your old bandit buddy who joined us told me all about you. You think yourselves stronger than everyone else, and yet you run and hide from every threat, every hint of danger.” He was growing angrier with every word, and he showed that by plunging his knife into her shoulder. This time she couldn't bite back the yelp, and she tried to pull it out. He just grabbed her wrist and pinned it to the concrete floor, the heat almost burning her were it not for her Aura. This was going horribly wrong for her, and she realized she had to find a way out before this monster killed her, or worse.

“How dare you fucking insult me with shit like this! You aren’t worth the shit on my boot, you pathetic fucking coward!” He ripped the knife out of her shoulder with his left hand and slashed at her face again, this time catching her eye, blinding her there. Before he could continue, he stopped, looked behind him, then looked back with a demonic smile stretched across his face.

“How about we feed you to the flames, huh?” He ripped her weapon off her hip, tossing it across the room, and grabbed her up by her hair before dragging her over to his forge, all the while ignoring her punches and attempts to escape his iron grip. He breathed insanely hot fire into the forge, bringing it to life. As he lifted her head over it, she could see the molten steel in there, instantly melted by his immensely hot flames. She grabbed the edge of it and tried to push herself away, but he stabbed her through the back of her hand, the blade embedding into the stone and pinning her there.

He held her hair back with one hand while slowly pushing her head towards the fiery liquid with the other. She struggled, but he was far stronger than her. She hated it, being completely helpless like this. She’d sworn she’d never be in a situation like this again, but here she was, about to be roasted alive by this crazy bastard. If she escaped, she had to tell people about his Aura-piercing ammo.

As a last ditch effort, she used her Maiden powers to knock him away with a gust of wind. He hit the wall with a hard thump and a pained grunt and she tried to run away, but the knife wouldn’t budge, and her blown out knee wouldn’t let her stand. She heard heavy thumps behind her, accompanied by animalistic growling as he marched back to her.

**“I’ve killed Deathclaws with my bare fucking hands, you weak bitch!”** He roared, his voice distorted by the raging flames in his throat making him sound demonic.  **“You think you’re hot shit?!”** The Fires of War were raging now, his entire body covered in flames to match his fury. She started unloading lightning into him with her good hand, and it worked. He froze in place and started growling in pain, his muscles contracting from the electricity. He fell to one knee, but it was only temporary, as he fought through the pain and stood back up, the flames surrounding his body further intensifying. She was worried he’d burn the house down. He marched toward her, the lightning only slowing him down.

He reached her and he grabbed her wrist, intensifying the heat in his hands to burn her. She lowered her hand in pain, and that was her final mistake. He grabbed her by the back of her head and started repeatedly slamming her face into the edge of the forge, roaring in overwhelming rage. This, combined with the previous damage she’d taken, completely shattered her Aura, but he continued. He didn’t stop until the edge was soaked in blood and her screams of pain were reduced to whimpers.

He’d stopped and fell to his hands and knees, screaming at the floor in rage. He collapsed, still conscious, but extremely worn out. He felt like he’d just sprinted across the Commonwealth, but he also felt great. He shakily stood up and looked at the still woman. Upon closer inspection, her face was a bloody mess, but she was still breathing, albeit barely. Figuring she wouldn’t be able to escape with that blade stuck in her hand, he picked up her weapon and left the forge room, not even bothering to close the door.

Outside, Gage was standing just beyond the door, a worried look on his face.

“You, uh, you good, boss?” He asked, clearly concerned. He must’ve heard everything from outside. Cainen just looked at him before turning around and walking to the living room.

“Get. Out. Now.” He growled. Gage nodded and got the hell out of there, but not before seeing the fucked up woman on the floor of the garage.

Cainen sat there in silence for a moment, just staring at the blank TV. He eventually snapped out of it and turned on the radio, tuning in right when Power Wolf was starting a story about his first time going on a raid with the Rust Devils. He started drinking straight from the Vodka bottle, leaving the Brahmin steak on the table after realizing he’d forgotten to heat it up. He was surprised the harsh liquid didn’t explode on contact with the flames in his throat, but he didn’t complain.

After a while, he’d cooled off, both emotionally and physically, and figured if he didn’t do something, the leader of the Branwen Tribe would bleed out. He got up and grabbed a Stimpak off the shelf as he did so. He entered the garage, the woman still lying there unconscious. He injected the Stim into her neck, the wounds on her face starting to heal. He removed the blade from her hand, though it took a good amount of pulling to dislodge it from the stone, even with his Aura enhanced strength, but decided to just wrap that wound in gauze later.

He carried her over his shoulder and took her to an old store room in the basement. After checking the room for any way she could escape, he found none, and so he plopped her in a metal chair. He used the strongest rope he had available to tie her to it, then stepped back and got another look at her. Her face had healed a good bit from the Stimpak, though she’d never get her eye back, and this was when he really noticed how beautiful she was. He was tempted to take advantage of her right then and there, especially after what she tried to do, but he decided against it. He wasn’t in the mood, and he had different plans for her.

Guess it was time to take down that Huntsman bounty he had put up.

**Meanwhile with Raider Radio**

“And that was the day I learned Ivy was a right fucking bitch. I’m glad I got the hell out of there before Cainen wiped them all out.” Power Wolf chuckled as he ended his story. “I hope you all enjoyed story time with Power Wolf, and now back to the music. Next up we’ve got-” He was cut off by his Scroll going off. He had set up a specific buzz pattern for when he got a message from the Overboss, and this matched.

“Oh, sorry about that folks, one second.” He turned away from his mic as he quickly read the message, and his eyes widened in shock. He’d heard a gunshot from the Overboss’s house, but he didn’t think anything of it. He didn’t know the leader of the Branwen Tribe had been getting her shit kicked in. He put his Scroll away and quickly turned back to the mic.

“Well well well, looks like I just got some big news from none other than the Overboss himself! Turns out he’s taking down that Huntsman bounty he had up for a while because he caught one who had snuck into his home. And you’ll never guess who it was.” He laughed. “It was the head of the Branwen Tribe herself! Y’know, that gang that tried fighting us once and ran when they got their asses kicked?” He was referencing an incident that’d happened just a few days ago in which a raider supply truck was ambushed by the Tribe. They weren’t expecting the raiders’ sheer ferocity in battle, and fled after sustaining heavy casualties. The raiders only received a few injuries, nothing some Stimpaks couldn't fix.

“And all you guys out there with your minds in the gutter, don’t even think about it. He’s not handing her over to you horndogs, so you’ll just have to make do with your imaginations tonight, you filthy animals.” He laughed again, this time coughing a little. He really had to cut down on the Jet.

“Now, as I was saying, back to the music. Next up we have Souls of Black by Testament. Not as heavy as some of the other stuff I’ve played, but I’m sure you’ll enjoy it all the same.” He turned off the mic and started the music as he went back downstairs to finish work on the nearly complete Sentry Bot for Cainen. It was visually identical to Ahab, but would be packing much more versatile firepower that he knew the Overboss would enjoy.


	5. The Plague Bringer Awakens

Jesamine and Locke approached the imposing gate of this so-called “Stronghold” in their pick-up truck. The two were physically polar opposites, with Jesamine being a short, slender and agile woman and her brother Locke being a large brute of a man. She looked out of the passenger side window at the fortress while Locke drove, her silver hair blowing in the wind, and she knew the place had earned its name. As they neared the gate, they stopped and the two freakily dressed guards called to them.

“What’s your business here?!” One of them shouted down the wall. They didn’t seem to be armed, but looks were always deceiving.

“We’re just here to check out the market.” She yelled back, hiding the worry in her voice. Both her and Locke had Huntsman training, along with their Auras, but they’d rather not fight an entire town's worth of bandits. The guard started at her for a moment before nodding at the other guard. He pressed a button and the gate slowly slid open. They drove their truck through, immediately spotting the parking lot and the signs pointing to the market. They were surprised to see a fair number of other vehicles parked there, none of them looking like raider vehicles.

They stepped out, and were further surprised by the lack of smell. With all the bodies outside, she figured they’d reek of death. They walked down the streets with store fronts flanking them, the old signs having been torn down and replaced with new ones. There were all different kinds of shops. Some sold weapons, some armor, some ammo, and there was even one that sold medical supplies and food.

“Alright, so who’s going where?” Jesamine asked her brother. He scratched his stubble for a moment.

“I say we go together. I don’t like the look of this place.” He said, suspiciously.

“Alright, let’s go to the weapons shop first.” She started walking over to the store with the sign “Big Guns Galore”. They walked in, and found the place to be surprisingly clean and tidy. The walls were lined with all sorts of weaponry, some they recognized, others they didn’t. Jesamine walked up to the guy at the counter, a Disciple if the metal mask and hood were anything to go by.

“Hey, what’ve you got for stealth?” She got right to the point.

“Well, that depends. Are you going for distance or up close and personal?” He asked, drumming his fingers on the counter.

“Hmmm, how about one of each?” The Disciple grinned.

“Alright, let’s start with melee.” He reached under the counter and pulled out a large, makeshift knife. “This is the Throatslicer, perfect whether you’ve been caught off-guard in an alley, or sneaking through a White Fang base, silent as a ghost. One strike to the neck or above, and they ain’t getting back up.”

Jessamine placed her finger on her chin as she thought about it. “There was a little thing under your sign saying you could modify your stuff.”

“And I can. The blade on its own with the serrated hacking blade is 3420 Lien, but for an extra 40, I can upgrade the blade to a cutlass.” Her jaw dropped at the price. Over 3k Lien? Was he crazy?

“What the hell makes this thing worth that much Lien?!” Jesamine shouted. Locke looked pissed, like he’d just caught someone trying to rip them off.

“Cause it can go through Aura like it’s nothing.” The two looked skeptical before the Disciple further explained. “We got a guy here, not gonna say who he is, who’s Semblance allows him to basically ‘enchant’ weapons with the ability to completely ignore Aura. However, it’s an extremely painful process and very tiring, so he only does it on certain weapons, like this one. We always name them as well, just to distinguish them from the rest.”

“And how do we know you’re not bullshitting us?” Locke piped up. He just shrugged.

“You two got Auras?” He asked. They both nodded, and they knew what he was asking. Reluctantly, Locke picked up the blade and lightly slashed it across his hand. He was surprised to see, and feel, it completely nullify his Aura.

“Y’see? Everything in here is worth what I charge for it, so don’t question my pricing.” The Disciple said, cockily.

“Well, before I buy it, what about ranged weapons?”

“You looking for Anti-Aura, or just regular guns?”

“Gimme Anti-Aura.” He once again reached under the counter and fished out a relatively compact pistol with a suppressor attached.

“This little beauty is the Deliverer, a stealth operative’s wet dream.” He picked it up, finger noticeably off the trigger. “Semi-automatic with a 12 round capacity, suppressor makes this thing damn near silent and the 10mm ammunition is relatively cheap, though the gun itself is 772 Lien.”

“What kind of mods does it have?”

“Well, there are four things I can change. The receiver, the barrel, the grip, and the sights. If you're looking to amp up the damage, I can swap out the standard receiver with an advanced one for 103 Lien. Not only is it the most powerful of the receiver options, it also makes the trigger more sensitive, so it can basically fire as fast as you can pull the trigger. All I can do with the barrel is extend it for 9 Lien, increasing the range a fair bit. I can install a sharpshooter’s grip for 28 Lien to make it easier to aim. And finally, I can slap some glow sights on it for 9 Lien.”

Jessamine raised an eyebrow. That was quite a lot to take in. “You sure know your stuff.” She mumbled.

“I wouldn’t be a gunsmith if I didn’t.” He said neutrally. After thinking about it for a while, she came to a decision.

“Alright, I’ll take the Throatslicer and the Deliverer, both fully modded.”

“Alright, that’ll total at 4383 Lien. I’ll even give you a coupon for a few boxes of free ammo that you can take over to the munitions store.” He pointed to the ammo depot across the street. She took out her wallet and handed him the right amount of Lien, him quickly counting it to be sure. He smiled and handed her her weapons after installing the mods, along with a holster and sheath. She strapped the two pieces of gear around her waist and was glad with how comfortable they were. She holstered and sheathed her weapons before the two left, Locke just wanting some ammo. It would seem that their trip all the way out here wasn’t that bad of an idea at all.

The Disciple sighed in relief as soon as they left, glad they bought the cover story. Cainen had had most of the weapons completely scrubbed of radiation before being authorized to sell, the ones still irradiated were to have their prices jacked. And the “Anti-Aura Semblance” was the cover story in case someone asked about it. Nobody outside the gangs knew how common their Anti-Aura weaponry really was, and he wanted to keep it like that.

**Meanwhile, with a certain bird**

Raven slowly came to with a groan of pain. She shook her head and started breathing heavily, trying to remember what had happened. She remembered following a truck, flying through an open window, then-

Her head shot up as she remembered everything that had happened, before lowering it in shame and pain. Her fight with the madman Cainen, if it could even be called that. He had caught her completely by surprise and beat her almost to death. She hated him for what he did to her. She wanted to kill him for it all, but she couldn’t. Not here, at least. She could feel the patch on her missing eye and the cloth gag tied around her head and keeping her from speaking. She looked around and saw no ways to escape. Her legs and arms were bound to the cold metal chair with extremely strong rope, and the chair itself had been bolted to the ground. All around her was cold concrete, with only a dingy lightbulb to illuminate it.

She tried to turn into her bird form, but found herself too weak. And even if she did, she needed Omen to open portals, so then she’d have to sneak through the house while still severely injured and find it. She’d tried using other items before, but Omen was the only thing strong enough to withstand the Aura surge necessary to get the portal going.

She was interrupted by the sound of the door unlocking, followed by a thud as whoever was there tried opening it the wrong way.

“You fucking idiot, it’s a push door.” She heard someone say in a hushed voice, muffled by the door.

“Yeah yeah, whatever.” The other person said, also hushed. She quickly dropped her head and pretended to be unconscious. She heard the door open and footsteps approach her.

“Alright, there she is. Now gimme the Jet.” She heard some shuffling, followed by what sounded like an inhaler being used.

“Aw yeah, that’s the good shit. Now get the hell out before the boss gets back. I wasn’t supposed to let anyone in here, anyway.”

“Hold on, I wanna do something real quick.” Her blood froze at the sound of a belt buckle being fiddled with.

“What the fuck are you doing?!” The other, seemingly more reasonable, Raider whisper-yelled. “Are you fucking retarded?! Cainen’ll kill us both if you even touch her!”

“He ain’t here. He’s off getting some dirt scratchers to join up with us, so he won’t be back for a while.” He touched her thigh, but there was a thwack and the hand was ripped away.

“Ah, what the fuck was that for?!”

“Normally I wouldn’t give a shit, but both our asses are on the line here, so if you touch her again, I swear to whatever god is out there, I’ll drag your dumbass to Mason and have you neutered and collared!”

“Alright, fuck, I’m going. Cockblocker.” The two were about to leave, when they stopped at the sound of the door at the top of the stairs opening. She heard footsteps coming down the stairs, but they didn’t sound heavy enough to be Cainen’s.

“What the fuck are you two idiots doing down here?!” The man yelled with an accent that she didn’t quite recognize. “Daniel, you better explain why you brought this guy down here, or I’ll kill you both here and now!”

“Alright, alright, cool it Gage.” She heard Daniel give in. “He said he’d give me some Jet if I let him have a look at her. Then he started pulling his pants down, and it took me punching him to get him to stop.”

She heard Gage grunt in response, before a gunshot rang out, causing her to flinch slightly, and a body and a bullet shell hit the floor.

“Oh fuck!” Daniel yelled.

“Since you stopped him from goin’ further, I won’t tell the boss what you did, but no Chems for the next month. Now get the hell outta here. I’ve got a mess to clean up.” There were rapid footsteps out of the room and up the stairs, before silence. She heard Gage sigh before he approached her and tapped her on the side of the head.

“I know you’re up, you cyclops.” He chuckled. Since she’d been found out, she raised her head and looked him in the eye, glaring at him with hatred. She would’ve insulted him were it not for the gag.

“You had the boss pretty riled up.” He chuckled again, pissing her off even more. “Almost had him as pissed as when his dog was killed. Though, granted, this time he didn’t go on a murder spree.”

He looked at her wounded knee and just shook his head in disappointment. “Y’know, based on what I heard and what Cainen told me, you went down pretty easily for a bandit leader.” He turned around and left, carrying the corpse of the would-be rapist up the stairs and closing and locking the door, leaving her all alone.

**Meanwhile, with Cainen**

The Overboss was driving back to the Stronghold in his raider-fied pick-up truck in a good mood. It had been a few days since he’d captured Raven, and he’d just gotten a text from Gage saying she was finally awake and angry as ever. Even better,in the days prior, the Raiders had managed to get a few more farms and towns to kick up to them, and the one he had just been to was the first to fight back, allowing him to finally let loose and freely kill some people. Their continued secrecy of their Anti-Aura weaponry continued to benefit them, as even their Hunstmen and Huntresses were easily gunned down, using their shock to their advantage. They now had a new outpost. And while he’d been there, he’d gotten a text from Power Wolf, telling him his Sentry Bot was ready. All in all, today was shaping up to be a good day.

He passed by a pack of Beowolves, and the recently installed missile turret in the truck bed made short work of them, blowing them all to bits. As he continued driving, he thought about how he’d force Raven to unlock the Auras of the others. He didn’t know if threatening her like he did the last kid would work, but maybe he could threaten to wipe out her tribe if she didn’t comply. They would be easily crushed by his forces.

That led him to his next line of thought. What would the Semblaces of the others even be? He figured Mason’s would be animal related in some way, and Nisha’s would probably be all sorts of sadistic, but Gage and Savoy? He really had no idea. Maybe he’d even let Power Wolf unlock his, if he liked the Sentry Bot enough.

He pulled up to the gate, not even having to honk his horn to get the guards to open it up. He drove in and parked it in front of the radio station, intent on seeing his new bot. He entered the waiting area just in time to see Power Wolf exiting out, his hands covered in dirt and holding a filthy rag.

“Oh good, you’re here just in time. I’ll show you your bot.” He beckoned him to follow and led him to the makeshift garage. In the center of the large room was what he assumed to be his Sentry Bot with a tarp draped over it. The robot expert walked over and grabbed the edge of the tarp before pulling it off, revealing the glorious monster.

It was covered head to toe in black hydraulic armor, except the head, which had a gas mask similar to Power Wolf’s strapped on for intimidation factor. It was armed with twin miniguns and had two mortar launchers attached to its shoulders, though he didn’t know what they were loaded with.

“I present to you, the Plague Bringer.” He rested his hand on one of its miniguns. “Armed with dual explosive miniguns, powerful enough to rip a pack of Deathclaws to shreds in seconds and leave nothing but chunks and bloodstains behind. Along with that, he has two launchers, both of which launch gas canisters, which is where the name comes from. One fires flesh eating gas, while the other fires stuff that’ll drive you insane, making you attack anything and everything in sight.” He walked behind the metallic beast and did something, causing it to come to life. Its red ocular lights shone out of the gas mask’s eyes, giving it a ghostly appearance.

**_“Plague Bringer online. Awaiting command from designated user: Cainen.”_ ** The voice was deeper than a normal Sentry Bot, making it even more terrifying. Cainen was  _ very  _ impressed by it. He wondered why Power Wolf scrapped the idea for making him similar to Ahab, but he didn’t really care. The Plague Bringer would be a vicious sight to see on the battlefield, especially if it was as powerful as the mechanic said it would be.

“You certainly exceeded my expectations.” Cainen complimented, hiding his excitement at seeing it in battle.

“It took a lot of work, but there’s some things you can only do by hand, and not with a workbench.” He said, sounding proud of his work.

“I’ve been thinking about something for a while, and this proves you’ve got what it takes to pull it off correctly.” He turned to Power Wolf, the large man still gazing at his creation.

“And what’s that, boss?”

Cainen chuckled, before explaining what he had in mind.


	6. Raw Power Unleashed

“This is Remnant Raider Radio with your host, Power Wolf, and I’m interrupting your regularly scheduled metal to bring you a very special announcement. Since I’ve finished working on Cainen’s project, he was so impressed with the result, he’s given me the go ahead to start a new ‘program’, of sorts. From 5 PM to 9 PM on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, I’ll be offering free lessons to anyone interested on how to build, maintain, and modify robots. The first gathering will be tomorrow, so if you’d like to learn how to build war machines of all shapes and sizes, just come on down to the radio station. Now, back to the metal, with My Apocalypse by Metallica. Pretty appropriate name, don’t you think?”

**With the Overboss**

Cainen walked down the basement stairs, donned in his armor but leaving the Problem Solver upstairs. Even if Raven had used her bird form to escape her bindings, she’d still be confined to the room she was locked in, and she’d still be far too weak to fight him. He opened the door and was satisfied to see her still bound to the chair. She raised her head to look him in the eye, glaring at him with her single eye. He grabbed a chair that had been sitting beside the door and set it down in front of her before sitting down himself. He stared at her back, the only part of his face she could see being his eyes, the rest covered by that intimidating mask.

“You put up a good fight, really caught me off-guard with those elemental powers of yours. If I hadn’t been roided up on my Semblance, you probably would’ve gotten me.” He laughed before pulling out a knife, the same knife that had caused her so much pain. Her eyes went wide open seeing it, and what little colour there was left her face.

“So you remember this? Good. Because if you don’t do what I say, I’ll make sure you lose more than an eye.” She tore her eyes away from the wicked blade and looked at Cainen, before slowly nodding her head. “Some of my guys will be here later today, and you’ll be unlocking their Auras. You know what’ll happen if you refuse.” She started making a noise that sounded like laughter, but he couldn’t really tell because of the gag. “You have something to say?” He slashed out, severing the gag but also nicking her cheek. “Say it.”

“Forget it, I’m not powering up your damn gang. I’ll die before I let that happen.” She laughed weakly, thinking she had the upper hand here.

“You may not care about yourself, but what about your bandit buddies?” He implied. She looked confused, before remembering he had an ex-Branwen Tribe member working for him, and they hadn't moved camp yet.

“Like I said, you stand to lose a lot more than an eye if you refuse.” She thought for a minute, but eventually gave in to his demands. The bastard knew she cared about her Tribe, and was using that against her. This was one of the few times she wished her brother would come and pay her a visit.

“Alright, I’ll do it. Just don’t kill them.” Cainen laughed that rough laugh again.

“Good. There’ll be five of them, Mason, Nisha, Gage, Savoy, and Power Wolf. Unlock all their Auras, and we’ll see about maybe letting you go.” Before she could retort, he got up and left, once again leaving her alone.

**Some time later**

Power Wolf entered his garage, eager to test his new Semblance. He looked around, looking for anything that would work. He spotted a blown out Eyebot in the corner and grinned. He aimed his arm at it, his hand relaxed, and latched onto the destroyed robot with his Aura, his arm turning the colour of rusted metal. He lifted his arm, and it followed perfectly. He held his hand in a claw shape, and it exploded outward, turning into a ball of jagged bits of metal all orbiting the empty space within. He moved his arm around some more and it followed seamlessly, not a bit of metal leaving the rotating ball of jagged rings. He clenched his hand into a fist, and it all collapsed into a perfectly smooth ball, all non metal bits forming spinning rings around it.

He marveled at it for a short time before he got even more ambitious. He started taking more and more scrap, levitating and shaping it to his will, grinning madly under the mask. Eventually he stopped and just stared at the cloud of sharp metal flying around the room, and yet nothing was knocked over if he didn’t want it to be. He pointed his arm at a practice dummy, and a series of blades shot forward faster than bullets, obliterating the large doll.

As a final test, he started moving and reshaping multiple objects into one area, creating a large ball of raw material. After mentaly picturing what he wanted to create, he snapped his fingers and the ball of material rapidly started forming a shape, quickly becoming a fully formed robot. It was only a basic Assaultron, but it was still there, ready to be activated. Well, he hoped anyway.

He went around to the back of it and hit the power switch, and it jolted to life, its singular red eye glowing with energy.

_ “Assaultron online. Awaiting command from perma-user: Power Wolf.”  _ It spoke in its default, feminine voice. Perma-user? He’d never heard that term used before.

“What do you mean by ‘perma-user’?” He asked the bot.

_ “Designation ‘perma-user’ is assigned to the creator of this unit. The designation cannot be overridden, and no other entities may command this unit.”  _ So, he was the sole owner of this and, presumably, all other robots he created in this manner?

“Interesting.” He mumbled to himself, before he addressed the Assaultron. “Stand guard inside the waiting area. If anybody enters, tell them to wait there, then inform me of their arrival.”

_ “Affirmative.”  _ It turned on its heel and strode out of the room, its signature footsteps being muffled by the door. He looked at the other scrap in the area, and began to wonder what other machines he could build with this power. He gathered more scrap with his Semblance, and looked over at the large area the Plague Bringer had once been.

“Let’s see if I can make a robot workbench.”

**With Savoy**

Savoy stumbled into his home, clutching his head. He had been the second last to have his powers unlocked, and at first he didn’t feel any different. He began his walk back to his house annoyed, and wanting to continue the torture of his latest victim to cheer him up, but a quarter of the way there, he started feeling a headache coming on. AT first he ignored it, thinking it’d go away on its own, but it steadily got worse as 

He practically broke the door down, not even bothering to close it. The walls of his house were covered in blood and decorated by body parts. He was hunched over and growling like a rabid animal as the pain increased. He got to his bedroom and threw his helmet across the room before sitting down on his bed with his head in his hands. His fingers tangled into already messy hair and dug into his scalp, almost drawing blood. His breathing became more and more heavy and labored as his painful growling became deeper.

He felt his hair start to thicken and he brought his hands in front of his to look at them. His vision was tinted red, but he saw thick black hair start to grow on his arms. His hands were becoming more beastlike, becoming larger and covered in fur, with his fingernails turning to large claws. He collapsed onto the floor, his yells of pain turning into roars. He started clawing at the floorboards, tearing them up and bringing the attention of someone outside. His hand lashed out, shattering a nearby mirror.

He stopped his thrashing and laid down on the torn up floor, breathing heavily. He slowly stood up, the bone spikes protruding out of his back scratching the ceiling. He looked around the room, seeing the destruction through red vision. He saw himself in a mirror shard, and would have smiled if he could. What stood before him was no longer human, but a towering Beowolf. An Alpha, if he wasn’t mistaken. His bone armor and jaws were terrifying for anybody that wasn’t him, and his red eyes left trails as he moved. He flexed his claws, and red energy blades burst forth. They glowed an unholy red in the dimly lit room, giving him an even more dangerous aura.

He whipped around upon hearing a shotgun being pumped. Behind him, standing in the ruined doorway, was a Disciple. He hid his fear well, but Savoy could smell it. It smelled like cooked meat.

“S-Savoy? You in there?” He asked, looking ready to pull the trigger at any second.

The monster laughed, his voice deep and coming out like a deathly rumble.

**“Where’s Cainen?”**

**In The Blood Zone**

While most of the others had decided to live in the, still standing, houses, Nisha and the other Disciples had torn down a neighborhood of houses and used the scrap to build an area not unlike the one they had in Nuka-World. It was much larger, yes, but it still felt the same. They couldn't have many prisoners, what with negative emotion and all, but if they only had a few, they wouldn’t attract that many Grimm.

Nisha walked into the torture area, spotting a man strung upside down by chains. He was so delirious from dehydration he didn’t notice her approaching him. He only reacted when she drew a blade and slit his throat. He thrashed around for a moment before he gave in to his wound and went still. She watched the blood spill out onto the ground, forming a slowly growing pool. She kneeled down and placed the palm of her hand into the pool of red, and watched with interest as it absorbed into her hand, turning her hand a shade of red. She stood up and looked at the dead man, and smirked.

“Let’s get some more.” She grabbed the slit throat with both her hands, and the body began to become extremely pale. Her hands started rapidly turning redder and redder, and before long, her hands were blood red and the colour was spreading to her arms. After she’d completely drained the carcass, she stared at her skin for a moment, before turning to another prisoner. She was staring at her in horror, and started struggling to get away. Nisha shot her arm out and a series of blood-forged spikes shot out of her palm and embedded themselves in the girl’s skull, killing her quickly. The spikes stayed there for a moment before melting back into liquid and flying back into her hand.

She summoned a small ball of blood, letting it hover in her hand and absorbing any drops that fell off. She flicked her hand and it expanded into a blade. It was long enough to be a sword, and extremely sharp. It wasn’t smooth either, the sides being bumpy and full of holes, giving it a diseased look. She liked it. She was about to leave when one of the Disciples ran up to her, out of breath.

“Nisha!” He panted,sounding panicked.

“What is it?” She questioned, dissipating the blade and reabsorbing the blood.

“It’s Savoy!” He quickly caught his breath. “He’s turned into a Grimm!”

**In The Pit**

Greyscale struggled against his restraints as he looked around the room. It was a simple concrete room with a single hanging lightbulb above him, illuminating everything. His arms and legs had been restrained with leather bounds. He would’ve used his stoen grey scorpion tail to cut the restraints, but they had pinned it to the wall with nails. The pain had dulled, but it was still there.

He had been spying on the Stronghold for the White Fang, but got caught when a supply truck spotted him and they hunted him down. It was especially insulting as it had been the first day and he wasn’t able to gather any valuable intel. They were going to kill him, but the leader of their group told them to capture him. Now he was trapped in what these savages called the Pit, where he assumed they tortured their prisoners for information. Well, they could do whatever the hell they wanted, he wasn’t gonna crack. He had been through Atlesien “advanced interrogation”, and nothing could top that.

He looked up at the red, metal door as he heard footsteps coming down the hall. He heard someone say something, but he didn’t know what. Then the lock disengaged, and it opened, the horrible screeching of the rusty hinges making him wince. A man walked in, someone he hadn’t seen before. He wore yellow, metal armor and had an eyepatch of the same material over his right eye. Beneath that he saw a regular white tank top.

The man scoffed. “Well you look like shit.” He taunted. He spoke with an accent. It was a little thick, but Greyscale could still understand him.

“If you’re here to torture me for information, you’re wasting you’re time. I’ll never rat out my White Fang brothers and sisters.” He sat straight up, looking the cyclops in the eye and showing his resolve. The man just looked unimpressed.

“Yeah, that’s what they all say.” He pulled up a chair and sat down in a relaxed position with his legs crossed. “Alright, here’s the deal. You have two options here. You can either tell me everything you know about the White Fang, and I’ll let you fight in the arena for your freedom. WIth that tail, you’d put on a good show.” Grey scale was about to respond when the man lashed out and punched him in the jaw, shutting him up.

“Don’t interrupt me, boy. Now, your second option is to be stubborn, I still get your info, and you never move again. Which would you prefer?” He crossed his arms and waited.

“Is that supposed to be a threat?” Greyscale challenged.

The man simply shrugged. “It’s a fact.” Greyscale just scoffed and continued staring in defiance.

“Alright, you asked for it.” He said casually as he stood up. He stood up and held his hands out lazily, when suddenly, his hands were engulfed in yellow electricity, crackling with energy and power. It shocked the Faunus, and he struggled a little. “Just don’t say I didn’t warn you.” He then placed his hands on either side of his head, without actually touching him, before unleashing energy into his head. His eyes rolled back and he started screaming in agony. It felt like his mind was being ripped apart and examined, all of his memories extracted and analyzed under a microscope. It felt like years of torture, but in reality was only ten second.

Gage’s head was twitching as he went through the man’s head, taking everything of value. He didn’t just find the location of the White Fang outpost, he also knew exactly how many soldiers were there, who the commander was, and even the fact that a shipment of dust was to be delivered there the next day. He pulled his hands back, shaking his head to gather his bearings, and looked at the Faunus. He had been left a twitching, frothing vegetable. His mind had been shattered, and there was no coming back for him.

“I told you you wouldn’t move again.” He taunted, knowing full well he couldn’t understand him. He sighed and drew his pistol, then put the bastard out of his misery with a shot to the forehead. He turned and left, the guard going in to take out the corpse. Cainen’d like to know about this.

**In The New Zoo**

Just like the Disciples, the Pack had built a new area of themselves as well. It was used to house the Pack as well as any animals they tamed. Cainen still wasn’t sure about letting them bring over creatures from the Commonwealth, but Mason hoped he’d change his mind.

Speaking of, the Alpha was currently sitting in his throne, pissed. Mason had been the first to get his powers unlocked by that Raven bitch, but, other than now having his Aura, he didn’t feel any different. He didn't immediately know what his Semblance was, unlike the others. Except Savoy, he seemed to have the same issue. He figured maybe it was just a subtle one, but that didn;t make him any happier.

One of his personal attack dogs, the only one Cainen let come over to Remnant, approached him with his tail wagging. It was one of the few that, while vicious in battle, was also very friendly towards the Pack and loved getting pets. Mason reached down to pet him on the head, but as soon as the palm of his hand made contact, his dog went limp like it had just keeled over.

“What the hell?!” He got up and examined his dog. The spot he had touched had turned the flesh black, and it seemed to be spreading  _ very  _ quickly. Mason backed up as the dog was enveloped in a black cocoon-like mass that writhed around. He drew his rifle and pointed it at the mass, unsure what was happening. After thirty seconds, the mass stilled, before it dissolved into ash, leaving behind a medium sized Beowolf. It stood up and looked at him, Mason sweating bullets. It then approached him, tail wagging, and licked him while panting.

Mason was stunned for a moment before his mind caught up and he realized what his Semblance was. He started laughing to himself while scratching his pet behind the ears, its red tongue hanging out.

“Hey boss, I heard some noise and I-what the fuck?!” One of his men was startled and froze, not believing what he was seeing.

“Get all the animals here! We’re making an army.” Mason ordered the raider. The raider nodded, a shocked smile on his face, then turned around and ran off, intent on telling the others.

**With Cainen**

Cainen worked on a new weapon in the Forge while also reflecting on what he’d learned. He’d found out everyone’s Semblance. Power Wolf’s ability to control scrap and forge things from it, Savoy turning into a super powered Beowolf Alpha, Nisha’s control over blood, Gage’s ability to extract memories, and Mason’s ability to turn animals into tamed Grimm.

He continued hammering at the blade. It was forged from Commonwealth scrap, giving it Anti-Aura capabilities. He figured he needed a melee weapon more intimidating than his combat knife, and so he was forging his new weapon, Brimstone. It was a simple longsword, but the blade was serrated and infused with Fire Dust, allowing him to ignite it with the Fires of War whenever he wanted.

He dunked it in the trough of ice cold water and let it cool. After it had cooled down, he took it out and was proud of his work. The Fire Dust gave the blade a slight glow, and it was perfect. He sheathed it on his hip, and knew there was only one thing left to figure out.

What to do with Raven?


	7. Preparations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Off-screen rape scene in this chapter. Don't say I didn't warn you.

Cainen and Gage sat in Cainen’s living room, discussing what had happened in the previous day. Neither were wearing their armor, just regular clothing. Everyone’s powers had been unlocked, some more interesting than others, and now they had no further use for Raven Branwen. He doubted anyone would be interested in rescuing in paying for the release of a notorious bandit leader, so Cainen considered just taking her head off with Brimstone, after having his fun with her of course, then mounting her head to the hood of his truck to inspire fear in his enemies. But Gage had another idea.

“You can do whatever you want with her boss. I’m just saying it would be a good idea for me to use Mind Wipe to take whatever memories she’s got. It’ll probably just give us good settlements to raid, but if we’re lucky, we might get the locations of some staches, if they have any.” Gage reasoned with him. Cainen took a sip of his beer, looking Gage right in the eye. He had thought the physical changes that came with the Fires of War had stopped, but this morning he had awoken to his pupils having turned into vertical, snake-like slits. It unnerved anyone he made eye contact with.

“Good idea. You can do that, but there’s something I wanna do with her first.” He said with a dark tone as he stood up, setting his beer bottle on the table. Gage just nodded and took a swig of his whiskey, before turning on the radio.

Cainen walked down into the basement, his heavy boots no doubt attracting Raven’s attention. He opened the metal door and entered her cell. She was still sitting there, but she looked even paler than before and extremely tired, no doubt exhausted from all the Auras she unlocked just the previous day.

“Hey, look at me.” He demanded. She weakly raised her head, her mouth gagged. Her single eye still glared at him with burning hate and resolve, something he respected, even a little.

“You’ve been real good to us thus far, and I’ve got a good feeling shit’s about to get a whole lot better for us. But you’ve outlived your usefulness.” He closed the door behind them, the hate in her eye intensifying. “Well, almost.” He undid his belt buckle and her eye widened in horror. She weakly tried to struggle, but even if she wasn’t restrained, she was far too weak. There was nothing she could do to stop him from forcing himself on her for his own sick pleasure.

**An hour later, because I’m not writing a rape scene**

Gage saw Cainen come up the stars, his face having that look he always had when he finished his “personal time” with any of his sex slaves. Like he had just gotten back from a massage rather than violating someone. Gage was never into that sort of thing, but he sure as shit wasn’t going to try and stop the Overboss. Cainen sat down on the couch, looking noticeably more relaxed.

“Been far too long since I’ve done that.” He said to no one in particular. He grabbed the beer from the table and finished it in one go. “She’s all yours now, let me know what you find out when you’re done.”

“You got it, boss.” Gage set his drink down and went down to the basement cell. The door was closed, though not fully. He opened it, and saw exactly what he knew he’d see. Raven was a mess, her clothes were torn, and she was bruised all over. Gage hated seeing the aftermath of Cainen’s “activities” and it sickened him. He preferred killing someone to just destroying them like this, but there wasn’t nothing he could do.

She raised her head and looked at him not with hate, like she had all the other times, but with one that screamed “help me”. Her eye was puffy from crying and her gag had been soaked through under her eye. He had really broken her. Honestly, what Gage had to do would be a mercy killing.

“I’m sorry.” He said, genuinely, which surprised even him. “But, if it helps, I’ll be putting you outta your misery soon.” He summoned his Semblance and placed his hands over either side of her head. Tears started rolling down her cheek again, and he let the energy free. Her screams were muffled by the gag, but they were still audible. Gage was in utter shock at what he was seeing, none of it was what he expected. He took everything in one fell swoop before letting go. As he came to, he stumbled back and hit the door.

“Holy shit.” He muttered to himself. He quickly threw the door open and sprinted up the stars, not noticing Raven was simply sitting there, unconscious, instead of the frothing vegetable all other victims had turned into.

“Boss!” He yelled as soon as he got to the living room.

“What? What did you find?” Cainen leaned forward, wondering what could have him in such a state.

“Everything I’m about to say is gonna sound crazy as shit, but I fucking swear to you, this is what I saw.”

**One crazy sounding explanation later**

Cainen had gathered his underbosses and sat them down in the old town hall, more specifically, the mayor’s office. It was now the Overboss’s office, but he rarely ever used it. This was the first time he’d really been in here for business. He had let Gage explain everything he had discovered from before, and everyone reacted differently.

“Holy shit, are you kidding me?! This Salem bitch is commanding these Grimm, and the retard, Ozpin, won’t tell anybody?!” Mason had actually stood up and was pacing around the room, his pet Beowolf, who was significantly smaller than Savoy, looking confused at Mason’s agitation.

“I figured something was going on, but nothing to this extent.” Nisha remarked, far more calm than Mason, as she was still sitting, but still very shocked by this news.

Power Wolf had his head in his hands, just extremely confused. “What kinda fucking plot twist is this shit?” He quietly asked himself, Savoy being the only one to hear it.

**“I’m not surprised in the slightest.”** Savoy said, not looking shocked at all, but, then again, it was hard to tell since he transformed. Since he was too big for chairs, he was just crouched on the floor.  **“With all this magical bullshit going down, especially the Grimm, I knew someone had to be pulling the strings. Just didn’t think it’d be two people fighting over those strings.”**

“Everyone, quiet!” Cainen yelled, getting everyone to shut up. “We need to keep Raven alive. She’s the key to getting the Relic of Knowledge at Haven, as only the Spring Maiden can open the door.”

Gage snorted. “Well, it’ll be hard for her to escape, what with her being weakened even further by Mind Wipe. It’s weird that she’s still conscious, though. Everyone else I used it on ended up totally comatose.”

“Well, what if it affects Aura users differently?” Power Wolf asked. Gage was about to shoot it down, but then realized Raven had been the first Aura user he used Mind Wipe on, so it wasn’t out of the question.

“We need to tell all the Raiders stationed here to keep an eye out for any suspicious birds, specifically crows. Her brother, Qrow, can turn into one, and will undoubtedly be coming to rescue her.” Cainen informed the others.

Savoy scoffed.  **“What stupid fucking name.”**

“I’ll let all my Disciples know to keep an eye out, and to not hesitate to shoot any.” Nisha said.

“Same here.” Mason piped up.

“Guess I’ll tell the Operators, since Mags and William prefer to stay in Nuka-World.” Gage shrugged.

“Good. And finally, we need to fast track the takeover of Anima. Where are we on taking over the farms and towns?” Cainen asked Gage.

“We’ve actually almost got them all under our belt. After word got out of our offers of protection, people have been a lot less reluctant to accept our deal. A few have resisted, but the Hunstmen around here don’t seem to give a shit about doing their jobs. If we bring in more reinforcements from the Commonwealth, we could have enough bodies to lay siege to Mistral and take the city, along with Haven.”

“We could even move the market from here to there. It would make selling a helluva lot easier.” Mason mentioned.

“Speaking of, how has our secrecy with Anti-Aura weaponry been?” Cainen asked.

Gage chuckled. “Oh, it’s worked perfectly. Everyone knows we have Anti-Aura weaponry, but they think it’s super rare. They have no idea every weapon we have, except most of the stuff for sale, is Anti-Aura. We’ll catch the Hunstmen guarding the city by complete surprise.”

“Perfect. It’s settled then. Power Wolf, go with a detachment of robots, including the Plague Bringer, to destroy the Branwen Tribe, then destroy that White Fang outpost Gage found out about. Take no prisoners, and show no mercy. Then, come back here, and prepare for the siege.”

“You got it, boss.” Power Wolf stood up and left, going to get ready for the slaughter.

“Mason, Nisha, after telling the guards here about Qrow, head back to Nuka-World and gather up as many of your people, then get back here. But Mason, also take back any creatures you have in the Zoo, the more dangerous, the better. Grimmify them so we can bolster our ranks, and wait for everyone to be ready.”

“Alright, let’s do this. I wonder what a Grimm Deathclaw will look like?” Mason said, getting up excitedly and leaving, along with Nisha. That just left Savoy.

**“What’ve you got for me?”**

“Head to Power Wolf’s workshop. I got him to make you some specialized armor that I think you’ll like. Afterwards, head to the nearest towns and farms and gather up any excess Raiders and recruits. Bring them back here, and get them pumped for battle. Seeing a giant Beowolf decked out in armor will probably get them pretty excited.”

Savoy grinned, he thought it was a grin, anyway.  **“You got it.”** He crawled out of the room, just barely fitting through the door.

“And I’ll go let the Operators here know about our potential guest.” Gage got up and left as well, leaving the Overboss alone. He sat there for a moment, contemplating what he was about to do, and smiled. It was time for the Remnant Raiders to make a statement. A statement that they are not to be fucked with. That they’ll take whatever and whoever the hell they want, whether you like it or not. A statement that they will climb to the top of the pile and immolate anyone dumb enough to try and stop them. Within the next week, Mistral would be his, Haven would be his, the Artifact of Knowledge would be  _ his _ . And if that coward, Ozpin, or that bitch, Salem, tried to stop him, they would know the wrath and power that men and women who lived in a world blown to hell can muster. They thought the Grimm were bad? Soon, the whole world would be under his thumb. And there’s not a thing they can do to stop him.

Through Fire and Brimstone, this world shall burn.


	8. Tying Up Loose Ends

Cainen walked through the sterile white halls of the Institute, earning shocked stares from more than a few of the human inhabitants, due in no small part to the physical changes his Semblance has caused. He had called a meeting of the Division Heads for a few reasons, but the conquering of Mistral was the main one. He had realized that he was too hasty in his announcement of the siege, and knew they would need help. Luckily, they had plenty in the Commonwealth, it was just a matter of telling them to do it.

He entered the meeting room and all the scientists turned to look at him, them having the same reactions.

“There’s some things we need to discuss.” He said as he walked over to his chair. He sat down and looked over the room. They were all still shocked into silence.

“If you’re wondering what this is,” He said, gesturing to his glowing hands. “It’s the side effect of something called a Semblance, essentially superpowers you can get on Remnant.” He let a small flame dance around his fingers as a demonstration before he extinguished it with his fist.

“But that’s not why I’m here. Dr. Li, how’s construction of Ares going?” He turned his attention to the doctor.

“Well, construction has gone exceptionally smoothly. Since most of the parts were recovered from Liberty Prime, it was mostly a case of reconstructing and reprogramming him. He’s undergoing the finishing touches as we speak.” She explained.

“Will he be ready within the week?”

“He should be ready by tomorrow.”

“Excellent.” He turned to Dr. Ayo. “How many Coursers will you be able to send to Remnant? I’m planning the assault of a large enemy stronghold, and will need all the reinforcements I can gather.”

“Ever since the Railroad was destroyed and Mr. Binet was executed, there has only been one Synth escape in the past year, that being the one you went after before the discovery of the IDT. So, following significant upgrades to our Synth Production Facilities, I should be able to send a minimum of a hundred, though I can send much more, if necessary.”

“Make it two and a half hundred.” He turned to the final person of interest. He was the Head of the newly founded Dimensional Research Division, Dr. Jack Fuar. He was bald with a scruffy, greying beard. He looked to be a bit older than Cainen, but was still very beefy, though he had a scratch over one eye due to a run-in with a particularly vicious Mirelurk King. It made him wonder why he chose the path of a scientist and not a fighter of some kind. His eyes held no emotion behind them, and he was only ever excited when nearing a breakthrough or talking about his research. The man was highly intelligent and efficient, but also cold and heartless, doing whatever was necessary to further his scientific progress. He was perfect for his position, as he never objected to the horribly inhumane experiments Cainen required of him.

“Have the Faunus experiments gone well?”

Jack leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms. “Aye, after a series of tests and experiments, I believe the Faunus are not formed of mutation or human interference, but classic evolution.” He said with a heavy Scottish accent. “In terms of abilities, it differs from genus to genus, but two common traits are night vision and enhanced hearing. Apart from that, I have observed enhanced strength in genus that are related to typically stronger animals, and enhanced speed with some others. Some Bird Faunus are even capable of limited flight.”

“And the Grimm?”

Jack grinned at that. It was his favorite topic. “Natural Grimm don’t survive long in captivity, so my experiment options are limited, but those created by Mr. Mason can survive. They are extremely vicious in combat. The Beowolves, while not as strong, are matched in sheer ferocity only by Deathclaws. And they are truly built to kill.”

“Good. I see putting you in charge of the new Division was a good idea.” He turned his attention back to the rest of the group. “That’s everything I wanted to discuss. You're all dismissed.” He was about to stand when Jack stopped him.

“Actually, there was something I wanted to ask.” He cleared his throat. “I wanted to move my lab to this ‘Remnant’, along with my assistants. It will make conducting my research much easier when I have direct access to potential subjects.” Cainen considered it for a second. He was most likely to agree, or at least not care, about what Cainen was doing over there than the other Heads. And he made a good point, it would make his work significantly easier.

“Alright.” Cainen agreed. “Once we’ve taken over Mistral and settled in, we’ll get a building ready for you, and you can use some Synths to help you move in.”

“Thank you, Director.”

“Now, that’ll be all. I have work to do on Remnant.”

**Meanwhile on Remnant, five days later**

A Disciple drove a raiderfied delivery truck to their final destination, flanked by two pickup trucks that looked like they belonged more in the Commonwealth than on Remnant. They were under orders by Cainen to take over any settlements surrounding Mistral. He had wanted to take over every settlement on Anima, but that was impossible, not within the week timescale before the siege. So he settled for taking over the ones surrounding the city and choking out any supply shipments and reinforcements. Once the targeted settlements belonged to the Raiders, or the settlers were dead, Mistral would effectively be cut off from most outside help. They even had one of the higher ups in the back ready to help out if the settlers were reluctant.

“Alright, we’re coming up on the last settlement we need to hit.” The driver said over the radio to the other cars. “Once they’re either working for us or dead in the ground, we head back to the Stronghold and wait for the siege to start.”

_ “Alright. The machine guns in the beds are locked and loaded, so you say the word, and we open fire.”  _ The driver of one of the trucks came through the radio. For the rest of the trip they were silent until they finally arrived at the town. The gate was already opened, which set off alarms in their heads.

“Something’s not right. Keep an eye out for trouble.”

_ “Gotcha.” _

They pulled up to the city hall, but it was like a ghost town. It was completely silent, and it didn’t help that the sun was going down. They all got out of their vehicles and looked around, their rifles loaded and ready to fire. The machine gunners were itching for a reason to shoot at something.

“What the hell? There’s no one here.” The driver of the main truck, a Wolf Faunus, one of the first to join up with the Disciples, said. He was clearly annoyed at not getting to kill anybody.

“Well, whatever the reason, I ain’t sticking around.” One of the secondary truck drivers started heading back to his vehicle. “Let’s just consider our job done for u-”

“Wait.” The Faunus stopped, looking like he was concentrating on something.

“You hear something?” One of the gunners asked. He stayed silent for a few more seconds, his ears twitching, before his head whipped up.

“Get down!” Everyone hit the floor, but it was too late for the machine gunners. They were killed by bullets coming from the nearby houses and some of the guys on the ground were hit as well. The rest started shooting back, but a few were gunned down. Only three survived the initial ambush, the drivers, funnily enough. The Faunus and one of the humans had run out of ammo, but the third had been hit in the side. He wasn’t bleeding much, which indicated nothing vital had been hit, but it looked like it hurt like hell.

The doors to the houses opened, and multiple White Fang came out, grinning with smoking guns. They knocked out the unharmed human with a rifle butt to the face and left the already wounded one, stupidly figuring he would die on his own. They approached the Faunus but stopped when they saw his ears poking out through his hood.

“Brother, what the hell are you doing with these filthy humans?” One of them asked incredulously.

“First, the name’s Micah, I ain’t your “brother”, and second, you guys don’t pay for shit. I’m loving this gig way more than when I worked for you people.” He pointed his rifle at them. “So how about you show me how wrong I am, huh?!” He was distracted when he heard a bang from his truck behind him. That gave his opponent enough time to close the distance and sucker punch him, sending him to the ground.

“And who’ve you got in there? More victims for your sick torture fantasies?” The WF grunt asked rhetorically. He approached it and unlatched the door, just about to open it.

“I wouldn’t open that if I were you.” Micah warned with a grin before spitting out a glob of blood. The dumbass just smiled smugly before opening it. As soon as he did, a massive, clawed hand shot out of the darkness, grabbed him by the head and pulled him in. Due to the fact that night had already fallen and the truck bed was facing away from any light, it was too dark for even the Faunus to see. The man screamed, but was cut off by a sickening crunch and a growl. His head was tossed back out, rolling up to the feet of the other terrorists, and they all raised their rifles, prepared to shoot whatever had just killed their comrade.

That same hand came out of the darkness and grabbed the edge of the opening, along with another on the other side. They looked like massive Beowolf paws, but were armored and slick with blood. Then the beast walked forward. It was a very large Beowolf Alpha, its maw dripping with fresh blood, but it was covered in thick metal armor, the armor being heavy, jagged and painted black, while also being covered in spikes and mounted skulls. The only thing they could see through its armor was its black fur and red eyes, its skull markings having been painted on its helmet in what very much could’ve been blood.

**“I’ll strip the flesh from your bones!”** It roared before pouncing. It landed on the nearest White Fang and tore his arm off before slashing another one in half. The others snapped out of their stupor and opened fire on the beast, but their bullets did nothing against its armor and Aura as it tore them to shreds. One tried to run, but Micah had recovered from the punch and was picking off any runners with his rifle.

There were still quite a few left, but Savoy was rapidly killing them. He ripped a man’s head off and swallowed it whole before slicing another’s stomach open. One of the quicker ones jumped on his back wielding a dagger and tried to find a weakness in his armor, but he didn’t get the chance, however, as Micah took aim and shot him off with remarkable accuracy. Suddenly, one of the other WF came at him with a shortsword. He tossed his rifle and drew his machete. She tried to hit him with a downward swing but he dodged to the right, lightly slashing her side as he did so. She quickly backed off, surprised by his agility, and he twirled his machete, beckoning her forward in a taunting manner.

“Come on, then! Show me how you earned that blade!” He shouted. She came at him again, this time feigning a stab. When he went to block, she purposely missed and punched him in the gut. He grunted, but held firm, she was surprisingly strong. She went for another downward swing, but he deflected it with his machete. As she stumbled, he grabbed the handles of both their weapons and threw them away, forcing them into fisticuffs. She tried to go for them, but a stray swipe from Savoy accidentally sent them flying into a wall.

He blindsided her with a punch to the head, sending her mask flying and almost knocking her over. He went for another one, but she blocked it with her forearm, using the opportunity to headbutt him hard. It knocked his mask off while making him spin around and stumble. She jumped on his back and tried to elbow him in the head, but he grabbed her shoulders and threw her over him. She landed on her feet and spun around, but he tackled her with a roar. He batted her hands away and grabbed her throat, strangling her. She started gasping for breath while trying to pry his hands off, which prompted him to squeeze harder. Her face started to go purple as her struggling weakened, and after a bit, she went limp and stopped struggling, but he twisted his hands, violently snapping her neck, just to ensure her death.

He rolled off her corpse and took a second to sit and catch his breath. This had been his first real combat situation fighting for anything other than the White Fang. Killing his former comrades was thrilling, and he knew he made the right choice in leaving them. He noticed it was oddly quiet and looked up, seeing Savoy watching him, having finished the remaining opponents.

**“You done with her?”** He growled, tossing an arm into his mouth and swallowing.

“You done with them?” He shot back. Savoy just grunted before walking back to the truck, dragging a corpse behind him.

**“Everyone, get back in your trucks! We’re done here.”** He ordered the surviving drivers. They all loaded up in their respective vehicles, then started the drive back to the Stronghold, with Micah cranking the music up to drown out the sound of Savoy feasting on his kill. They had successfully cut off Mistral from any support, and now he just had to hope the others that had been deployed would get their jobs done as well.

**Meanwhile, deep in the forest**

Power Wolf walked through the sea of green, seemingly alone. He was wearing his normal clothes, except for an undone trench coat over top, mainly because it made him more intimidating, but also because it looked like it was about to rain. He was approaching the Branwen Tribe’s camp, and it looked pathetic. The only defenses it had were a ring of steel-reinforced wooden walls surrounding it, and two guards posted outside the gate. Before they could spot him, he took some of the moorings from the metal, shaped them into blades, and launched them into their throats. He continued his approach to the gate, only stopping to make sure the guards were dead.

He manipulated the metal to tear the gate open with ease, alerting the rest of the Tribe to his presence. He walked in, everyone either raising a rifle or preparing a melee weapon. One of them, a short girl with shorter dark brown hair, stepped forward, an angry expression on her face.

“Who the hell are you, and what are you doing here?!” She yelled angrily, matching her expression. Power Wolf remained silent for a moment, his face covered by the intimidating gas mask as he turned his gaze over them.

“My name is Power Wolf, and Overboss Cainen has sent me here.” The girl’s face went pale, along with everyone else there. So they did know who they were.

“How did you-”

“That doesn’t matter.” He cut her off. “You have two options.” He raised his hand into the air, and all of their weapons came with it. They all looked up, shocked, before he merged them all into a solid ball and let it fall to the ground with a heavy  _ thud _ .

“You can either surrender yourselves to the Overboss’s will, or you’ll submit to mine.” He warned ominously. There was a potent silence in the air, before one of the big guys thought that it would be a good idea to charge him and attack. That didn’t end well for him, as a large blade shot out of the metal ball and cut him in half at the waist.

“Option B it is, then.” He pulled out a walkie talkie from his pocket and brought it up to his mouth.

“Rain down hell from on high.” He said before dropping it in the dirt. He raised his arms in the air in the same manner a priest might worship their god, but nothing seemed to happen. Then, they heard it. A strange whistling coming from above them. They all looked up and saw a pair of objects, one green and one red, flying towards them, both leaving trails behind them. Before they could move, they impacted the ground with such force, it sent the gas they had been containing all throughout the camp almost instantly.

Men and women screamed as their flesh was consumed by the green gas, while those with Aura who were immune to it were instead driven mad by the red gas and started tearing each other apart. Power Wolf walked slowly through the battlefield, like the Grim Reaper himself, killing anybody who tried to attack him with a bloody machete he’d hidden in his trench coat.

Eventually he reached the temporary leader of the group, Vernal, he remembered Gage told him. She was sitting against a wall, her eyes bloodshot and looking around frantically while mumbling incoherently. She was one of the very few that wouldn’t be homicidal, but simply insane. He knelt down in front of her, and she focused on him.

“You’re a demon.” She managed to struggle out. 

“We all are.” He told her before he swung his machete and took her head clean off, her body seizing for a moment before slumping down into the blood-soaked mud. He picked up her head by the hair and examined it. It wasn’t trophy worthy, as she had been far too weak to even be considered for that honor. He raised it to the sky as it began to rain and yelled in victory, before putting it in a burlap sack, along with a few other heads, to later be presented to Cainen.

He left the camp behind, the screams slowly dying down as the remaining bandits killed each other off, the bloody sack slung over his shoulder. It had been far too long since he’d been able to go out into the field, and this had been the perfect opportunity to properly test his new Semblance. He would have to go out and do this more often, but now he had a White Fang base to clear out. With how much metal they used compared to the bandits, he wondered if he’d be strong enough to just raise the whole base and send it plummeting to the ground. Well, only one way to find out.

**Two hours prior, Mistral**

Allison wandered through the streets of Mistral, wearing a pair of jeans and a black t-shirt, along with a red backpack. It was hot here, despite the time, and it annoyed her. She wished the city was farther north. She had her long red hair flowing freely due to her not caring to try and tie it up.

She had been ordered by Cainen to infiltrate the city and sabotage the CCT Tower, the tools to do so being in her backpack. She had joined the Pack not long after they started making moves in Anima, leaving her settlement to go join them.

Since she was buddies with the gate guards of Mistral and nobody knew she’d joined the Raiders, she was able to get through without being searched, and she was able to find the Tower fairly easily. She sat down on one of the benches and pulled out her Scroll to text her boss, Mason.

_ “Alright, I’m outside the Tower, do I just head inside and blow the place up?” _

After a moment, there was a response.  _ “Judging by the blueprints Cainen got for me, that big ornament on the top isn’t just for show. It’s the main transmitter. The supports go down into the lookout just below it, and one well placed explosion will bring the whole place down. Don’t forget, plant it in a subtle spot. We’ll wait to detonate it just before we start the siege, and we don’t want anybody finding it. Afterwards, once the other guy we sent ahead of you, Dakota, to take care of the other tower is done, meet with him at the Sleepy Boys Inn. Then leave in the morning.” _

She was about to put her Scroll away, when she got another message.

_ “By the way, how the hell’d you get on Haven grounds? Dakota wouldn’t say, and I thought they only let students and family up there.” _

She grinned while typing up a reply.  _ “You’d be surprised how much some eye candy can soften up a guard.”  _ She pocketed her Scroll and walked over to the Tower, the receptionist smiling at her as she entered

“Welcome! You can use any of the consoles here or at any of the other floors, but we close in half an hour, so please be quick.” She greeted.

“No worries, I’ll only be a minute.” Allison responded before heading in.

She casually walked to the elevator, passing by rows of consoles. She was a little surprised by just how few people there were. She only counted five people, which was just fine by her. She entered the elevator and hit the top button, and after a minute of going up, she arrived at the top. She took a peek out and breathed a sigh of relief when she saw there was nobody else there, which would make her job infinitely easier. She looked around the room and saw a few minor supports on the sides of the room along with the main support in the middle, but they didn’t look strong enough to hold up anything without the primary support.

She approached the large, technological pillar and examined it, looking for any spots she could hide the explosive. She eventually found a ventilation grate, barely big enough for it to fit. She took her backpack off and kneeled down to open it, within being the explosive, described as being something called a “Mini-Nuke” rigged to blow. She didn’t really know what that was, but it was fairly big and heavy. She didn’t have the detonator with her, so if she got caught after planting it, Cainen could still detonate it, and even though it was way out of triggering range, it was set up to automatically connect when within a couple miles radius.

She quietly opened the vent and looked inside. It went forward a bit before dropping, but, using the shadows from a light in the drop, she could see there was another grate a bit in the drop. If she slid it in, she’d be able to hide it in the vent without it falling anywhere unexpected. She set it in the vent and pushed it hard. It slid along the smooth metal and fell in the drop, the top just barely visible, though it’d just looked like a lump of nothing to anyone looking in there.

With a smile, she closed the grate and went back to the elevator. She hit the button for her floor and went back down. She couldn’t believe this was going so smoothly, and she was full of adrenaline from everything, but she was still wary in case something did go wrong. Before it reached her floor, however, it stopped at someone else’s floor. She stifled a groan and saw as the door opened, revealing the guy that had called the elevator. They both looked surprised to see each other, but the guy still entered. He had short green hair and brown eyes and was wearing sweatpants and a blue shirt. The elevator closed, and she could tell by the way he was eyeing her up that he wouldn’t make this trip pleasant.

“What’s a beautiful thing like you doing out so late?” His piss-poor attempts at flirting annoyed her.

“None of your business.” She said sternly, trying to get him to back off. The elevator felt like it was taking forever.

“Hey, relax. Smile a little, maybe then more guys like me will be interested.” He said with a bit of bite. It made her want to bite his ear off.

“Guys like you?” She scoffed. “I’d rather not get attention from inbred fuck-wits like yourself.” As soon as she said that, the elevator door opened and she left, leaving him shocked behind her. That felt almost as good as it would’ve been to kick him in the balls. She left the Tower and started walking towards the Bullhead Station. She got on the Bullhead and took the ride back to town, spotting the sign for the Sleepy Boys Inn from the window. Once they landed, she made a beeline, just wanting to relax already.

She got to the Inn and walked in, looking around the waiting room. She spotted her fellow undercover Pack member sitting on a couch in the corner, doing something on his Scroll, so she walked up to him and sat down next to him.

“You Dakota?” She asked. He looked up at her and nodded. He was pale, had shaggy black hair and blue eyes.

“That’s me. I already rented the room, I was just waiting on you.” They both stood up and walked to the stairwell. “It’s room nine.” He pulled out a key and unlocked the door, pushing it open. The room was fairly nice. There was a window with descent curtains on the opposite wall, a large bed on the left wall along with the door to the bathroom, and a TV on the right wall. In the corner was a cushioned chair, but it looked like it hadn’t been used in a while.

“So, how’d your bit go?” Dakota asked as he closed and locked the door. “Some of the douchebags there made me want to kill them, then myself.”

“Other than some guy trying to flirt with me in the elevator, nobody really bothered me.” She sat down on one side of the bed and took her shoes off, glad to be free of them.

“Lucky.” He said with a chuckle as he got on the other side of the bed. After a moment of silence, she heard him grumble something before there was a rustle.

“I’m not gonna beat around the bush here, Allison. You’re sexy as hell, I haven't had a good lay in a while, and I’m still on the adrenaline from pulling off the job. So you wanna fuck?” She turned to look at him, being a combination of surprised and impressed by his ballsiness, and saw he was lying with his hands behind his head, shirtless, allowing her to get a good look at his figure. He was fairly muscled, but not exactly beefy, and he had raised an eyebrow as if to say “Well?”. It didn’t feel like an order either, it felt like a friend asking for a favor. She thought for a moment before sighing and taking her clothes off, leaving her in her black underwear.

“You’re lucky I’m in the same mood.” She said coyly as she took his pants off and straddled him with her hands on his chest, getting ready for a wild night. Luckily, the walls were soundproofed, so nobody heard them as they went at it like animals, not like they’d care anyway.


	9. The Iron Howl

Cainen sat within his personal truck as he watched the gate of Mistral through a pair of binoculars. It was a truly large city, larger than even Diamond City. And it would soon be his. Behind him was his massive siege force, which was just barely hidden within the treeline of the thick forest. He had gathered every spare Raider he could, and the Institute had calibrated the IDT so when he sent the signal, they would send in every available Courser, along with Ares. He could practically taste the blood that would be spilt. He was brought out of his musings by Power Wolf running towards his truck, his trench coat flapping behind him.

“What is it?” Cainen ordered, as he didn’t like being interrupted. He had abandoned his previous mask before they left for the siege, and had forged a new one out of reinforced steel. It had the visage of a skeletal demon, with four horns curved back behind his head and a pair of two, long fangs jutting down to his chin. It had no lower jaw, exposing his bearded chin, and his demonic eyes only made it more terrifying.

Along with the mask, he’d made a pair of clawed gauntlets, forged from Commonwealth steel to give it that Anti-Aura flavor, with a pair of leather gloves to boot.

“Sorry to bother you, boss, but we’ve got an issue. I did some more research on the CCT system, and it turns out if any of the Kingdoms lose connection, the whole damn thing shuts down across all of Remnant.” That shocked Cainen. Were the people who designed this thing really that stupid?

“Shit, that _ is  _ an issue.” He mumbled under his breath. Now he was in a bind. Everyone was geared up and ready to go, but now they had a severely double-edged sword waiting to be triggered up there. He thought for a moment, but couldn’t come up with an adequate solution. They could just leave the bombs undetonated, but then they’d be able to call for reinforcements. But if he did detonate them, then everyone on Remnant would know something was wrong. Not to mention, they’d lose access as well until Power Wolf was able to rebuild the Towers.

“What would happen if we only destroyed one of the Towers? All the other Kingdoms have one combined Tower, while Mistral’s is split.” Cainen suggested. Power Wolf thought for a moment, before realizing something.

“If that happened, they’d still have a connection, but it’d be severely weakened, most likely to the point that they wouldn’t be able to broadcast outside of Anima. It’d leave the system intact, so none of the other Kingdoms would know anything.”

“Good.” He took out the detonator, which was rigged to both bombs, and tossed it to Power Wolf, who caught it with ease. “Break it down and reforge a new one that’s only rigged to one bomb. I don’t care which one.” Power Wolf nodded and left. After a few minutes, a Disciple came up to him with the new detonator. He gave it to Cainen and left to get ready for the siege. He examined it, and it looked exactly the same as the last trigger. He pulled out his walkie talkie and spoke to Power Wolf through it.

“I got the trigger, breach the gate.”

_ “Got it. Let’s raise some hell.”  _ He set down the walkie talkie and picked up the detonator. After a second, a massive flaming gas tanker they brought in from the Commonwealth went flying out of the treeline and started on a course for the gate. He could see the guards through the binoculars scrambling as it quickly neared. Right before it impacted, he pressed the detonator and watched as one of the CCT Towers in Haven was blown to pieces. The initial explosion must have triggered the Dust fueling it, as the explosion was much larger than a mini-nuke was normally capable of, and completely obliterated the Tower. Right then, the tanker hit the gate and blew it to hell. Now their wall was severely breached, and their only means of contacting help and calling in reinforcements had been destroyed. Time to go.

He blew his horn and hit the gas, as did every other Raider there. Before the guards could recover from the explosion, they heard the rumbling of what sounded like a stampede. They looked out and froze at the sight. Hundreds of raiderfied vehicles, ranging from weak little cars to beefy garbage trucks, were barreling towards them, each one packed to the brim with bloodthirsty Raiders. And, what was even worse, most of the cars also had Grimm hanging on. They had no idea how they’d managed to tame Grimm, but they had.

The garbage trucks were the first through the gate, smashing aside anything remaining in their way and clearing the way for the smaller vehicles. The citizens fled in the other direction, but many were gunned down by the Raiders. Then the delivery trucks, including Cainen, came in and that’s when all hell truly broke loose. Instead of Raiders in the back, like the defenders thought, out poured Grimm, courtesy of Mason. Then the smaller vehicles came in, and the entire attacking force was inside the city.

Cainen got out and opened up the back of his truck, letting Savoy out to play. As he walked further to the front lines, Power Wolf walked up to him, holding the Institute signal device.

“Shall I?” He asked. Cainen chuckled.

“Bring in the big guns.” He ordered. Power Wolf pushed the button, and they waited. They had tested it beforehand, the Institute had received the signal, so they weren’t surprised when they heard the all too familiar  _ bangs _ of Coursers being teleported in with the Raiders. With the Coursers at their sides, the Raiders were filled with energy, and pushed forward harder, killing civilian and Huntsman alike. But something was wrong.

“Where’s-” Cainen was about to ask, but was cut off as a massive portal opened up nearby, vaporizing a house. And from out of the portal stepped Ares, War Incarnate. He used to be known as Liberty Prime, but now served a new purpose. The complete and utter annihilation of Cainen’s enemies.

His metal had been painted black and was covered in spikes. Instead of utilizing his fists, he wielded a massive double-sided two-handed ax large enough to cut down a building like it were a tree. He now wore a massive helmet with curved horns like that of a goat, and hanging from the horns were two Deathclaw skulls. Any lights on his body were now blood red instead of the soft blue they had once been, and his built in backpack containing his nukes now had two large exhaust pipes curving from out of the sides and into the air, shooting out flames and thick smoke. And on his shoulders were dozens of spikes, each one with a skull impaled on top. It looked to the city and pointed his ax with one hand.

**_“YOU STAND IN THE PATH OF CONQUEST!”_ ** He spoke, his voice distorted by the modifications.  **_“YOU ARE WEAK, AND SHALL BE PURGED THROUGH FLAMING STEEL!”_ ** He fired an eye beam, obliterating an incoming Bullhead.  **_“I AM ARES, AND YOU SHALL JOIN YOUR DEAD GOD IN OBLIVION!”_ ** With his speech finished, he marched forward and started wreaking havoc in the city, destroying groups of defenders and tossing nukes at any heavy resistance.

“Well, they really outdid themselves.” Cainen said to no one in particular, as Power Wolf had gone off to join in the killing. He was truly amazed by the power of Ares. With him, they were sure to conquer this city. He racked the bolt on his rifle and charged in, killing anyone in his way.

As they pushed further into the city, the resistance started to thin out as they started retreating back to Haven. Cainen walked through the city, surrounded by bodies and burning houses. Many of the Coursers had been sent to the walls to kill any Grimm that were attracted to the negative emotion, and he could hear them gunning them down with their energy weapons from where he was.

He had reached the middle section of the city, the industrial district, if the large factories were anything to go by. These would serve him well to churn out munitions and robots, they’d just need some interior renovations. He was brought out of his musings by an explosion deeper in the district. He checked his ammo then charged back into the fray.

**With Savoy and Nisha**

The two Disciple leaders were tearing a path to the Market District as their crew fought alongside them. Savoy ripped a young Huntress’s arm off before plunging his claws into her chest, killing her. Simultaneously, Nisha would absorb any blood Savoy spilt and use it to kill her own opponents, as she launched several blades into a soldier’s body. They had been given orders from Cainen to secure the Bullhead Station for Power Wolf. From there the Raiders would gather and he would get them up there with his Semblance.

“Savoy, you go on ahead! I’ll pick off any stragglers!” Savoy just grunted in approval before charging forward. Each of the Huntsmen wanted to kill him for the glory it would bring, but none of them expected him to have an Aura. In the distance they could hear Ares ripping and tearing through the defenders.

**_“YOUR ATTEMPTS TO DEFEAT ME ARE LAUGHABLE.”_ ** He boasted as he blasted another fortification to ashes with his eyebeam.

Savoy pounced on a Huntsman and slashed his chest open with his energy claws, the blood flowing into Nisha’s body. She in turn used that blood to riddle a group of soldiers with blood spikes, killing them quickly as they shredded their armor.

One of the soldier commanders ducked behind cover as a volley of gunfire went his way. He reloaded his rifle before grabbing his walkie talkie.

“Where the hell is Atlas?! We’re getting our asses kicked out here!” He yelled to the dispatcher.

_ “They took out one of the CCT Towers. It’s left the system intact, but now we can’t contact anyone outside the Kingdom.” _ There was a heavy sigh.  _ “We’re on our own here.” _

“Well, I’m not letting these bastards get to my fa-” He was cut off by an emboldened Operator taking his head off with a sword stolen from a dead Huntsman, before tossing it aside and opening fire with his rifle.

Power Wolf was also tearing the defenders apart, as his robots and students fought through. Most of the students, since taking lessons from Power Wolf, had taken his advice to distinguish themselves from the other gangs by taking on a more militaristic look. They had abandoned their hair paint, metal masks and armored suits, and had adopted gas masks similar to Power Wolf’s, along with full suits of Marine Combat Armor from the Island, some even in full suits of power armor. They were also more coordinated, though still held that Raider savagery, as was most prominent in their butchering of their victims. Power Wolf wasn’t complaining about any of this, as it would make the final stage of Cainen’s plan for them much easier.

Their robots, on the other hand, looked like creatures from nightmares. They charged forward, emitting mechanical screeches for war cries as they literally tore their enemies apart. The Sentries would act as the front line, mowing down defenders with their heavy weaponry, while other, less tanky bots, would provide support and pick off any stragglers.

Power Wolf severed the hand of a Huntress who got too cocky and swung too early, causing her to scream out in pain. He grabbed her by the neck, lifting her up so her friends could see her, then slit her throat with his now infamous machete, the Harvester. He tossed her aside and looked out over the battlefield as he stood on a roadblock, pleased with how they were handling themselves.

“Keep pushing, don’t let up!” He ordered. “Save the gas as a last resort! I don’t want to have this place cut off to us after we take Mistral!” He hopped down from the roadblock and followed the fighting, dispatching anyone foolish enough to challenge him. After quite a bit of unremarkable pushing, the defenders had all retreated back to Haven. Predictably, they took the Bullheads with them, cutting off access to the academy. Or so they thought.

Power Wolf quickly created a metal platform from the equipment of the dead defenders, the Raiders getting on, along with Power Wolf, before being lifted into the air. Before they reached the top, he made some battlements along the front edge to give his men some cover, and just in time as well. As soon as they came over the edge, the soldiers and Huntsmen opened fire. Their bullets bounced off the thick steel, allowing the Raiders to shoot back. Since there weren’t many defenders left, they were quickly pushed further back, back into the school itself.

Before they could move forward, something went flying past them all, flying through a window of the school with a loud crash. The Raiders just ignored it, and pushed forward.

**With Cainen**

Cainen crashed through the window, rolling to stop his momentum. He had gotten caught up in a failed Huntsman ambush, and wasn’t able to reach the metal platform before Power Wolf took off. So, he did what any reasonable Raider Overboss would do. He got Ares to throw him over the cliff, though it seemed the throw was much harder than it needed to be.

He looked around and saw he was in a bathroom, the men’s to be specific, if the existence of urinals along the wall was any indication. One of the stalls opened, and a confused student peeked his head out.

“The hell was-” He stopped when he saw Cainen, his face going white. After a moment of them staring at each other, he slowly closed the stall door, wisly pretending he didn’t see anything. Cainen grunted before leaving the bathroom and out into the halls. They were strangely quiet and empty, what with all the students and teachers being outside trying, in vain, to fight off the Raiders.

He walked through the halls, Brimstone drawn and ready to be ignited, but there wasn’t a soul to be seen. As he neared the stairwell, he heard frantic talking from just above him. He read the sign and saw that above him was the office of the school’s headmaster, Leonardo Lionheart. He was probably trying to call for help. Cainen rolled his shoulders, prepped for a good fight, and walked up the stairs.

He entered the office, but initially didn’t see him, though he could still hear him very clearly. There was one large desk flanked by two, smaller ones. The walls were lined with bookshelves, while the wall behind the desks had windows overlooking the school grounds. But he noticed one of the bookcases had been swung wide open like a door, exposing a secret stone hallway. He walked through, and the desperate cries for help grew louder.

“They’ve completely taken the city, and it won’t be long before they kill the students and take Haven! You have to do something!” He heard the cowardly man beg. He was cut off when Cainen began dragging his left hand along the wall, leaving behind scratch marks and filling the air with loud screeching. He turned and entered the room.

Standing there was Headmaster Leonardo and a strange Grimm he’d never seen before. It looked like a crystal ball covered in bony plates atop a platform ringed with spikes, along with barbed tendrils coming out of the bottom. The ball was cloudy with red mist, but it was clear he had been speaking to someone through it. The old man slowly turned around, his face white as a ghost. The fool was unarmed.

Cainen came to a stop, this time dragging Brimstone’s tip along the ground, leaving a scorched trail as he laughed a deep and menacing laugh.

“So, you’re the one in charge here.” He looked him up and down. “How did an old coward like you end up in a position like this?” He stopped and stared him down, Leo practically trembling.

“Look at you, might as well be pissing yourself from fear.” He began approaching him, the Headmaster backing himself into a wall.

“Wait! I’ll do whatever you want, just please don’t kill me!” Leo begged, damn near on his knees.

“You wanna know something, you filthy fucking coward?” He got right up in Leo’s face, the cowardly lion against the irradiated demon.

“You should have taken us out the moment we took over the Stronghold.” He then thrust his clawed hand into Leo’s throat, heaving him up. The old man’s eyes widened, staring into Cainen’s, and he started grabbing at the offending limb, with no success. After a second of letting Leo choke, Cainen ignited his hands, setting Leo’s head on fire, then heaved him over his shoulder with one hand, sending him flying into the wall. He bled out on the floor for a moment, struggling to stand up, before succumbing to his wounds and perishing.

Cainen breathed deep, savoring the smell of burned flesh, before being distracted by the sound of clapping. He looked at the Grimm, seeing the mist had cleared and was revealing someone who looked exactly the way Gage had described her. It was Salem, leaning back in her throne, smirking and clapping.

“Well done, Cainen. I didn’t think you would be able to pull this off.” She said snidely.

“I finally get to meet Salem, the Queen of the Grimm.” He said, glaring at her through his mask.

“So you know who I am. Good, that will make things much easier. I’m sure you can guess, but I have a proposition for you.” Yeah, he expected she would try to recruit him at some point, but he was surprised that Leo was in her pocket.

“The Raiders don’t work for anybody. We know what we want, and we know how to get it, and what we don’t want is a partnership.” He shot her down quickly, and her smirk disappeared.

“I don’t think you realize you aren’t in a position to negotiate.” One of the Grimm’s tendrils shot out at his throat, intending to strangle him and force him to give in, but he caught it and it wrapped around his armored hand. He twirled his arm, wrapping it around his forearm and getting a better grip, before pulling the Grimm towards him. As it flew, he swung Brimstone, severing all of its tendrils in one go and leaving it writhing on the floor. He looked down at it, seeing Salem’s furious expression made him chuckle as he loomed over it.

“Now you’ve fucked up.” He warned as he brought his heavy boot down on the Grimm’s head, shattering it to pieces. The mist floated in the air for a moment before dissipating, and he left the dissolving corpse of the unknown Grimm behind, but not before taking a memento from Leo.

**With the others**

Gage grinned as they cleaned up the last of the defenders. By some miracle, they had taken only minor casualties, most likely because they had taken the whole city by surprise and scared the shit out of them, demoralizing them to hell. He was about to enter Haven itself to wipe out any survivors, but was stopped when the door was kicked open, and out came Cainen.

“Boss!” Gage said, surprised by his appearance. Cainen remained silent, looking out over his forces, before walking forward through the crowd. The vast majority of the Raiders had remained in the city, hunting down any survivors. He reached the cliff edge and looked out over the city,  _ his  _ city, and the Raiders looked back at him, also silent. Then, he lifted the head of Leonardo Lionheart by his blood soaked hair and let loose a mighty victory cry. The Raiders followed suit, the wave of noise incredibly loud, and it only intensified as he tossed the head into the crowd, turned, and walked back to the members of his circle.

“So.” Gage started. ”What now?” Cainen looked at him, along with the others.

“All of you, follow me, we have much to discuss.” With that, he led them to the academy, intent to make it, along with all of Mistral, the new Stronghold.

**Hours later**

Power Wolf’s men waited patiently in their new base within Mistral, in their armor and uniforms, standing stock still with their hands clasped behind their backs, the various robots in servitude to them lining the walls. In front of them was a stage, as this was their meeting room. The room was silent, until heavy footstep came from the stage. From backstage came Power Wolf, now wearing Elder Maxson’s old armored coat, a gift from Cainen. He gazed out over them for a moment, his face hidden behind his signature gas mask, before he addressed them.

“Men, you all fought incredibly today, and largely because of that, this city is now under the rule of the Raiders.” He praised, pacing back and forth with his hands behind his back. The other Raiders had noticed that his mannerisms had changed ever since he unlocked his Semblance, and it was clear the power was the cause of it.

“But that’s not why I gathered you all here today. I gathered you here today to tell you why Cainen let me start this little program in the first place, and that is because we are the foundation of a new gang, the fourth alongside the Disciples, Operators, and Pack.” He stopped in the middle of the stage.

“Inspired by the Rust Devils and what they could’ve been, he gave me permission to start a new gang!” He raised his hands into the air, and two large flags unfurled beside the stage.

“We are the Iron Wolves!” He shouted as the flags revealed their new symbol. It was a forward facing wolf head, smoke pouring out of its eyes and the corners of its mouth, the head black and the flags themselves red. The Wolves raised their rifles into the air and roared in support, causing Power Wolf to grin maniacally under his mask.

“We will bring this world to its knees in the name of Cainen, and rule it with an iron fist! None will stand in the way of our march of our war machines as we destroy our enemies!” His voice echoed through the hall, giving his words more power.

“And this is where our conquest will begin.” He said as he stepped to the side. The curtain behind him opened, revealing a window giving them all a perfect view of a massive factory that Power Wolf had spent the last few hours building. It had put his Semblance to the test, but it worked, and was now ready to pump out hundreds of destructive war machines. It was outside the walls of the city, but had its own defences in the form of hundreds of robot patrols and turrets. Black smog already poured from the smokestacks, indicating it was ready for use.

“Ad bellum! To war!” He cried, his soldiers repeating the new motto. He waved his hand, dismissing them. They left for the factory, eager to begin work on their army.

**With Cainen**

Cainen stood before a camera, ready to record the message that was to be broadcasted all over Remnant once the destroyed CCT Tower had been repaired. After thinking about it for the past few hours, mainly trying to figure out a name better than the Remnant Raiders, he knew what to say. He nodded to the Wolf behind the camera, and he hit record.

“Hello, people of Remnant. If you don’t know who I am, it’s probably because your government has tried its damndest to keep the existence of me and my group a secret. Though, I can’t blame them.

“I am Cainen, leader of the Warborn Raiders, the new rulers of Anima. The Headmast, Leonardo Lionheart, was so damned useless, he basically let us grow like a festering disease until we took over the body. And because of his inaction, the city of Mistral, now to be known as Oblivion, is the new hub of the Warborn. Don’t be afraid, as we have no intentions of expanding to the other Kingdoms. Hell, we’d even be willing to trade, if the rest of the world is willing. We just have one request.

“Do not attempt to liberate our new territory. We have weaponry the likes of which you have never seen before, and we will not hesitate to use it if you prove… ‘uncooperative’. I hope you enjoy having new neighbors, as we certainly will.” With that, the Wolf ended the recording. He had discovered that each of the CCT Towers held the ability to override all other broadcasts taking place throughout the system. It was only ever meant to be used during an emergency, but it will suit his needs perfectly.

Now he just had to wait for the Tower to be finished repairs, and everything would be in motion. He walked back to his throne as the Wolf packed up the recording equipment and left. He sat in his throne, one forged by Power Wolf, covered in the metal visages of screaming skulls and two large Angel of Death statues flanking it.

It felt good to be King.


	10. The Relic Of Knowledge

Boris approached the Oblivion radio station, the one that would, from now on, be hosting the Warborn Radio, and looked at the note Power Wolf had left him. Since he was the General of the Iron Wolves, the masked man no longer had the time to host the radio, so he appointed Boris to be the new one.

“Chert poberi.” He grumbled with a heavy Russian accent as he scratched his short beard. “How did I get roped into this?” He was just wearing some regular clothing, a tank top with jeans, due to how hot it was outside, so he could easily be mistaken for a civilian, the only thing being was he had an accent not native to Remnant.

He entered the building and was glad it had AC. The reception area was empty, barring the assaultron guarding the area. Speaking of which, it spotted him and got into a combat stance.

_ “Intruder, identify yourself.”  _ It spoke in a modified female voice. Boris just sighed.

“It’s Boris, you dumbass.” It froze for a second as it scanned him before getting back into a neutral position.

_ “Identity confirmed. You will be in booth three.”  _ It responded.

“Booth three? There’s nobody else in here, why not one?” He asked, frustrated. The radio station would only ever be used by him, unless Cainen or one of the other bosses needed to make an emergency broadcast, but that would be rare. The robot didn’t respond, so he just entered the hallway, grumbling insults at it.

The hall was fairly clean, aside from a few bullet holes and blood stains from when the people holed up in here were wiped out. Why couldn’t they have cleaned up a little more, aside from getting rid of the bodies? He counted off the booths as he went. It didn’t take very long for him to find number three, but now he knew why the first one wasn’t available. It was riddled with bullet holes and the second one was saved specifically for emergency broadcasts, so that just left him with the third one.

He walked through the door, and was impressed with how clean it was. Guess nobody wanted to become Dr. Fuar’s next test subject by messing the place up more than it already was. He sat down in the comfortable mobile chair and grabbed the headset. While the old place had a set mic, this one had a wireless headset you could wear, and it would work so long as you didn’t leave the booth. He didn’t know why the old place didn’t have one, but it probably had something to do with budget.

He put them on, and was surprised by how comfortable they were. He was beginning to like this. After taking a moment to sit there and look around, he turned on the headset and flipped down the mic.

“Uh, hello? Test test?” As he spoke, the volume bars on the device next to the computer responded, meaning it was working. Now he just had to upload the playlist and start the broadcast. He pulled out a second note, along with a USB. The note had instructions on how to operate the booth, and the USB had the playlist, which consisted of all the songs Power Wolf told him to put on, along with a few he put on himself.

He booted up the computer and plugged the USB in, and it immediately began downloading the playlist. Now that that was ready, he walked back over to the desk, sat down, and hit the big red, “Go Live” button. After a couple seconds, the “Live” sign over the door lit up, indicating he was ready to go.

“Alright, now before I even start, let me make something clear.” He started. “I’m sure you’ve heard of the Iron Wolves, and if you haven’t, you’ve gotta be some special kind of stupid. Well, anyway, since the old host, Power Wolf, doesn’t have the time to do this shit anymore, what with him being the General of the new gang and all, he’s got me doing it now. The name’s Boris by the way.

“Now, I've got some news for you glorious degenerates. Since you’re hearing this, that means we’ve repaired the CCT Tower we destroyed, and Mistral, now named Oblivion, is under Warborn rule! That’s fucking awesome, as we haven’t had a foothold this strong in a while.

“And second is we’ve moved the market from the Stronghold to Oblivion, and the old rules from there still apply here. If you come for business and don’t go anywhere except the market without permission, we won’t fuck with you, and anyone who does fuck with a paying customer will be castrated. Or whatever the female equivalent of that is.” He chuckled as he rolled the chair over to the computer.

“Now, the first song on our list is one I haven’t personally listened to, but Power Wolf vouched for it, so I’ll put it on. We’ve got Through the Fire and Flames by DragonForce for your listening pleasure, just hope it’s mine as well.” He cut the mic and hit play, and was met by immediate audible heaven as the song kicked off.

**Cainen**

Cainen was kicking himself for killing Leo so soon. He had no clue where the entrance to the Haven Vault was, and now he was stuck scouring the entirety of the school trying to find a clue. If he’d just let Gage have at him, he wouldn't have to do this.

He was currently in the main hall after having thoroughly searched the Headmaster’s office, now his throne room, but hadn’t found anything so far. He was examining the large statue of a woman who looked like a large female genie, as it was the most important looking thing there. It was made of white marble and had golden chains surrounding it, along with various jewelry. He examined it more closely, then noticed something. AT the end of the chain wrapped around the woman was an empty pendant. If he knew anything about secret entrances, it was that the key hole was often hidden in plain sight.

Since Leo was the Headmaster, and given how paranoid the old man was, he had to have had the key on him at all times. Cainen thought back to when he looted his body, and remembered he had found a golden pocket watch. He had kept it as a trophy for killing a Headmaster, and it was currently in his Throne Room. He wasn’t sure if it would work, but he had to at least try.

He walked up the stairs and entered his Throne Room, immediately going to the display case that held his watch, along with the weapon Leo had wielded. He opened it up and grabbed the watch, before remembering he should probably retrieve Raven if he was going to open the Vault. He pocketed the watch and made his way for the prison where she was being held, along with a variety of other prisoners. She didn’t know about him wiping out the Branwen Tribe, so if she’s reluctant, she’ll just need a reminder.

**A few minutes later**

Cainen pulled up to the prison in his truck, honking the horn to let the guards know he was here. The place was large and looked just like a prison you’d find in the U.S.A. Guess some things never change. All the filthy Asian decorations had been torn down in exchange for more appropriate hanging corpses and twisted metal totems. The Pack had been given the residential district, closest to the gate, the Operators had been given the market district for obvious reasons, the Disciples had been given the industrial district, and the Iron Wolves were operating out of a massive factory that Power Wolf had spent most of a day building, along with the prison. It was designed to pump out hundreds of basic robots, but had sections where you could create custom bots. He was currently working on a new factory for the creation of weapons, but they needed more materials.

Cainen approached the prison, spotting the guards, both Iron Wolves, standing rigidly and keeping a sharp eye out. They had their standard Marine Armor with gas masks, and it cut an imposing figure. They spotted him and immediately saluted. If he didn’t know any better, he’d think they were ex-military instead of Raiders with how much Power Wolf has managed to whip them into shape.

“At ease. I’m here for Branwen.” He said. They both relaxed and the one on the left stepped forward.

“I’ll take you to her cell. Follow me.” He said, his voice sounding like it was coming through a radio due to the mask. He swiped a card through the card reader, opening the door to the prison and they both walked through, closing it behind them.

“She’s been unruly since she was transferred here from the Stronghold, constantly trying to escape.” The guard said as they walked through the halls. The cells on either side of them were mostly empty, with the few prisoners there quickly backing away. “We don’t believe she’s learned of the destruction of her Tribe, she’s probably just losing her mind due to the torment.” They entered the Solitary Confinement Wing, and while the regular area was quiet, this place was almost dead silent. “This is where we keep any captured Aura-Users, which is currently just Branwen. General Wolf was able to create a series of radiation collars which suppress Aura while leaving the wearer, mostly, unharmed.” They came up on a cell with a heavy iron door with a big red “5” painted on the door.

“She’s in here, sir.” He swiped that same card through the lock, and the door came open. Inside was Raven Branwen, huddled in the corner in the fetal position, hugging her knees. She looked up at them, and her eye widened when she saw Cainen, no doubt remembering how their last “meeting” went. She was dressed in rags and was wearing one of those collars, along with bandages all over her knee which still hadn’t fully healed.

“Alright prisoner, the Overboss is taking you off our hands for a while. And don’t bother trying to escape, as he won’t be half as lenient on you as we have.” He grabbed her arm and hoisted her up, her limping along with her crippled knee, all the while never taking her eye off Cainen. As they led her out, she didn’t struggle, knowing how futile it would be to escape in this state. They got back outside and the guard took his original post while Cainen brought Raven to his truck. He tossed her into the back, then closed and locked the door, before he got in the driver’s seat and drove back to Haven. It was time to see if this little plan would work.

**Back at Haven**

Cainen led Raven into the Hall while bringing out the pocket watch. As soon as she saw what he was holding, she realized what was going to happen and she started struggling more, desperately trying to prevent him from gaining the Relic.

“Y’know, I’m just starting to realize that I could have gotten one of my younger Raiders to kill you and take the power. Then I wouldn’t have to deal with your shit.” He threatened her, looking her in the eye as he did so.

“What’s it matter? You’ll just kill me afterward anyway.” She shot back, still struggling.

“Well, I guess you have a point.” He punched her in the head hard enough to knock her out, then carried her over his shoulder the rest of the way. He inserted the pocket watch and watched as the hands spun in random directions before the statue lowered into the floor, revealing an elevator.

“Alright, let’s go get this Relic.” He walked into the elevator and it automatically started going down, the jagged stone passing them. Raven stirred, and he wondered how she’d react to this little situation. She didn’t fully wake though, so he guessed he’d have to wait longer.

“How long is this fucking elevator ride?” He grumbled impatiently. Immediately, the wall opened up to a large cavern. It consisted of a wide stone bridge with three large circle carvings leading to a golden door protecting a massive tree that looked like it should be called the Tree of Life. The elevator stopped at the bottom, and the circles began to light up as they walked forward. At this point, nothing surprised him anymore. He crossed the bridge, wary of anything that might crawl up from the ravines flanking him, and approached the door. It was covered in ornate golden leaves, and looked sturdy. After a thought, he dropped Raven, jolting her awake.

“Get up and open the door.” He ordered. She stared up with defiance, though that defiance disappeared after he kicked her in the gut, causing her to cry out in pain.

“I won’t tell you again.” This time she listened, and she stood on wobbly legs while clutching her abdomen. She hated this damn collar. She walked over to the door, and after a moment's hesitation, she pressed her hand to it. The door glowed, then started folding in on itself, revealing what was behind it. What it showed was a vast desert with a stone path leading to the Relic of Knowledge floating above a pedestal. Now  _ this  _ surprised him. He walked out into the desert, watching for any potential threats, and approached the pedestal. As he neared it, he realized it looked like a fancy genie lamp, though it was a lot smaller than he’d thought it would be. He carefully grabbed it by handle,and almost sighed in relief when it suddenly started obeying gravity and hung in his hand. He examined it more closely, wondering how it was activated, before grunting in approval and leaving the desert.

Immediately upon exiting, Raven tackled him to the ground with surprising strength and tried to wrestle the Relic from him, though with little success. He drew his blade and attempted to slash her throat, but she anticipated this, as she moved just enough for the blade to hit the collar. It cut cleanly through the metal, and it clanged off onto the ground.

“You clever little-” He was cut off when Raven hit him with a blast of wind, sending him flying into a wall, though he clutched the Relic tightly. He grunted in pain, but was ultimately more angered than hurt by it. As he stood up, the Relic conveniently shrunk so he could fit it in his pocket. He drew Brimstone and ignited the blade, causing the defiled Maiden to flinch in brief fear.

“I don’t need you anymore, so let’s make things interesting by killing you and seeing who becomes the next Spring Maiden.” He then lunged at her, her dodging and trying not to get hit with the Anti-Aura blade. He swung again, but this time cutting the floor, turning the cut into a wall of flame, Raven pulling back as the flames rose.

“You don’t even have your weapon.” He taunted as he walked through the fire with no injuries. “How about I take your head off and send it to your husband? I’m sure Tai would be shocked to see you.” He laughed at that, and she froze. How the hell did he know about him?

“Oh yeah, I know every little bit about you. Your drunken brother, Qrow, your slutty daughter, Yang.” He continued insulting her, having stopped approaching. “And even your weak piece of shit friend, Summer, who I wish I could’ve killed myself just so I could have seen the look on her face.” He was getting excited, and that manifested itself in his flames intensifying. After he insulted Summer, she snapped and jumped into the air, hovering there, determined to end his reign of destruction. She held both her arms out and screamed in anger as she let loose a massive blast of flame, so powerful it shook the walls of the cavern. If the intense heat didn’t kill him, the force would blast him off the edge of the bridge, killing him that way.

After a solid thirty seconds of fire, she stopped and fell to the floor, worn out and on her knee. She looked up and saw he was gone, instead replaced by a massive scorch along where the blast had hit. She steadily stood up and started walking over to the elevator. She didn’t know she would escape, but she would find a way. She’d have to find her weapon first, then she could make a portal out of here.

She was stopped by the sound of metal rending flesh and a horrible pain in her chest. Her eye widened and she slowly looked down, seeing almost the entirety of Brimstone’s blade jutting through her gut. It then withdrew and she fell forward and rolled onto her back, gasping for air and looking up at the ceiling. She heard heavy footsteps coming toward her, and she looked to see Cainen, covered in light cuts and scratches.

“You hit me pretty hard, I’ll give you that.” He said through heavy breaths. He knelt down beside her, setting Brimstone on the ground. “I’ll see you in Hell.” He was about to get up when Raven, as a last ditch effort to escape, decided to bite the bullet and use her arm to focus her Aura and open a portal directly beneath. However, while the portal opened, the force of the Aura blew her arm off up to the shoulder.

She hit the ground, and immediately someone rushed over to her.

“Raven?!” She heard her husband, Tai, yell in surprise as he knelt over her. It looked like they were in the kitchen, though it was hard to tell through the haze, the only thing she could really make out being his face. She cried in pain a little as blood began pooling around her, staining the floor a deep crimson.

Through struggling breaths, she was able to say one final thing before succumbing to her wounds.

“C-Cainen’s got the Relic.” The last thing she saw was Tai scooping her up in his arms and running for the door.

**Back with Cainen**

Cainen would be lying if he said he wasn’t surprised by what had just happened. The portal had remained open for a while afterward, and he was able to see where she had gone. Tai had rushed over to her, but had then looked up and saw the Overboss through the portal. He hadn’t seen someone that filled with hate since he had attacked the Minutemen. Preston had vowed to hunt him down and make him suffer for what he’d done, to avenge the innocent lives he’d taken. He didn’t take those threats very seriously after he shot him in the head. He stood up, his back to the elevator, and looked at the shredded arm that used to be Raven’s. Now he knew why she never used her Semblance without her weapon until now, even after everything she went through.

He sheathed Brimstone and walked back to the elevator, the Relic still safely within his pocket. He rode back to the surface, and was met by Gage, alongside a large number of Raiders, all pointing their guns at the elevator. Once they saw him, however, they relaxed.

“Holy shit, boss! The hell happened down there?” Gage asked, clearly surprised. “I heard an explosion come from down there, so I gathered up some of the boys to kill anything that came up. I didn’t know you were down there!” Cainen was tired from the fight, the flame blast having overloaded him, and so he just pushed his way past them and to the stairs.

“I’ll explain later, but right now, I need to sleep.” He looked out the window as he went up, and saw the sun was beginning to set. He must’ve been down there longer than he thought. He got to his room and stumbled inside, slamming the door behind him. He made his way to the bed, taking his armor off as he did, before flopping down, falling asleep almost immediately.

At some point in the night, he awoke on his back, feeling thirsty as hell. He got up and made his way to his kitchen, throwing on some clothes and taking the Relic with him because it provided a little light, and opened the fridge to grab a beer. Popping the cap, he took a swig and turned around, only to freeze as he saw someone, or some _ thing _ standing in the doorway. It looked like a person, but it was tall, it having to duck its head to avoid hitting the doorframe. It was completely black, to the point it looked like a silhouette, and its face was completely featureless, all except for a pair of bright white, glowing eyes that lacked pupils. It stared at him, completely motionless with its head slightly cocked to the side. Its presence genuinely gave him chills, the first time he’d felt even a little fear towards something.

“Who are you and how did you get in here?” He demanded, able to keep his voice steady. It stared at him for a while longer before speaking.

_ You do not belong here.  _ It spoke in a harsh whisper that sounded like it was coming from within his head. Still, it didn’t move, remaining as still as a statue. After what felt like an age of silence, with only the hum of the open fridge to break it, it spoke again.

_ Seek out my Relic of Destruction, hidden within the Shade. I will be waiting.  _ He blinked, and the figure was gone, what was left behind was one word scratched all over the wooden doorframe.

“Jinn?” He said, confused. Then, everything seemed to stop. The air seemed to still and the buzz from the fridge stopped.

“Oh, what now?” His question was answered when the relic started glowing in his hand and floated toward the open space in front of him. It spun a little, before something began forming above it. As it took shape, he realized what it was. It was the genie that had been made into the statue that guarded the entrance to the Haven Vault. She was voluptuous, but Cainen’s more primal side was very much suppressed by everything else in his mind, such as what the fuck was happening. She fully formed, and looked down at him with sternness.

“What knowledge do you seek?” She asked.


	11. A New Perspective

Ozpin watched the operating theatre through the window of the viewing room as Raven was hastily operated on by a number of highly trained surgeons. He had gotten the call from Tai, saying Raven had appeared through a portal in his kitchen, mortally wounded and talking about the leader of the Warborn, Cainen.

He had quickly made his way over, along with Vale’s finest surgeons, to assess the situation. He had chosen not to inform Qrow, as he still needed to spy on Oblivion, and would surely come running if he knew about his sister’s condition. He watched as the doctors worked tirelessly to save the woman’s life, as they had for the past three hours straight, when one of the head doctors entered the viewing room, a clipboard in hand.

“She’ll live, but a full recovery is impossible.” He began. “Whatever took her arm, it completely destroyed the nerves in her shoulder, so even if we still had it, we wouldn’t be able to reattach it.” He gave the forlorn news, but Ozpin was simply glad to know she would survive this ordeal. “The cause of the wound through her abdomen seems to be a sword, and she’s lucky it didn’t hit her spine. A little to the left, and she wouldn’t be able to walk.”

“Will I be able to speak to her after the operation?” He questioned the doctor. He thought for a moment before answering.

“She’ll be heavily sedated, but yes, she’ll be conscious.” When Ozpin remained silent, the man simply left the room to resume his duties.

Ozpin sat in the waiting room for the next few hours reading a newspaper, alongside Tai, who had his head in his hands and was completely silent. Ozpin looked up as one of the nurses poked her head out of the operating theatre and beckoned for him to enter. Ozpin went to tell Tai, but realized he had fallen asleep, and so decided to leave him be.

He entered the dimly lit room and saw Raven in the hospital bed, hooked up to a number of machines to read her vitals and keep her alive. She turned her head to look though it was hard to get a proper read of her emotions due to the drugs she was on.

“Well, this isn’t how I expected our reunion to play out.” He partially joked.

“Can it Ozpin.” She croaked out, clearly not amused. After a short pause, he stopped beating around the bush.

“When Tai brought you here, he said you were saying something about Cainen, though he couldn’t quite tell what.” She clenched her fist at the mention of the man that had ruined her, then calmed down.

“Do you have any idea what he did to me while I was locked up?” She asked, rhetorically. “He beat me, tortured me, raped me, and he would’ve done much worse if he had the time.” She was showing a surprising amount of emotion, which just went to show how much that monster affected her. “And now he knows everything about you and your little shadow war.” She revealed, causing Ozpin’s brow to furrow in concern. Did he really torture her that badly?

“How? I doubt he was able to break you through conventional means.”

“One of his higher-ups, Gage, can use his Semblance to forcefully extract peoples’ memories. It leaves normal people completely comatose, but only gives Aura-Users a migraine. He used it on me, and discovered everything. He found out about you, about Salem, and about all of your little secrets, including the Maidens and the Relics.” She stopped to swallow. “And now he has the Relic of Knowledge, and he’ll undoubtedly try to get the others.”

This revelation shocked Ozpin. This mad man now knew everything about his war with Salem, and may even be working with her already. Not only that, but he had weaponry the likes of which Remnant had never seen before. First Anti-Aura munitions, then this super weapon, Ares, and now he had recently threatened them with further weapons that were currently unknown if they tried to attack him. Strangely, he said he had no intentions for expansion, but nobody was buying that. It was just a question of when he would start making moves, and who his next target would be.

“Does he know how to use the Relic?” He asked urgently.

“He only knows as much as I did, so no, not as far as I know. But it’ll only be a matter of time before he figures it out.”

“What can you tell me about him personally?”

She snarled. “He’s a sick bastard. Enjoyed every second he had abusing me, regularly reminded me of how weak I was to him, and even dabbled in his love of cannibalism right in front of me. He rules mostly through respect, since everyone working for him loves how much they’ve gained through his rule, but there’s also a fair amount of fear to it. They’re terrified of what he’ll do to them if they step out of line.”

Ozpin pondered this information. His cruelty sounded like it matched Salem’s, except instead of genocide, he’s power hungry. That could be used to their advantage, but they’d need some sort of leverage.

“Thank you for this. I’d like to ask you more in the morning, but for now, you should get some rest.” He was about to exit the room when Raven stopped him.

“He knows about Ruby, and he’ll probably come after her at some point.” She coughed out that last warning before falling asleep, concerning him. If he really knew about the Silver-Eyed Warriors, he would make them a priority. He exited the room and took out his Scroll. It was about time he called a certain dusty old crow.

**With Cainen**

“What?” Was all he could say to the woman, as his brain was still half asleep.

“Every century, I can answer three question fully and truthfully. So, what knowledge do you seek?” She quickly explained, clearly not wanting to talk to him, but being forced to. Cainen was surprised, he had no idea this was how the Relic gave out knowledge, but at least he now knew how to use it. But only three uses every hundred years? He’d have to make this count.

“What was that creature that I saw?” He asked his first question, still staring warily at the empty doorway, half expecting it to reappear and lunge at him.

She glared at the place where it had been. “That was Exitium, the spirit housed within the Relic of Destruction.” As she explained, she showed him images of the Spirit of Destruction. Most were what he saw before, but a few showed him with large antlers, teeth and claws, along with a much more skeletal appearance. “What you saw was only a projection of himself, as his true form is kept within the Relic. While I was made by the God of Light to bring knowledge to humanity and help save it, he was made by the God of Darkness to bring chaos and death. The only reason he would appear before you is because he has seen the evil in your heart, and has deemed you worthy of wielding the cursed blade he resides in.” She finished, waiting for the next question.

“Who are the current Maidens?” He needed this one answered if he was going to obtain the other Relics.

“You already know the Spring Maiden, Raven Branwen, but the Winter Maiden is Fria, an old woman living in a hospital in the Atlesian Capital. The Fall Maiden is Amber, a young woman on her deathbed in Ozpin’s secret lab hidden within Beacon. And the current Summer Maiden is Astrea Storm, a young lady trying to live peacefully in the upper district of Vale after having tried living in Vacuo.” Cainen froze at the last one.

“Astrea Storm?” He said, the name sounding familiar. Then he remembered where he’d heard it. “Astrea fucking Storm?! That was the name that god damned synth I was hunting was using, how in the fuck did she get the Maiden’s power?!” He was almost in a rage, his Fires flaring, but he quickly calmed himself and chuckled a little. “Guess synths really do have souls, not that it matters. For my last question, answer me this. What are the other Kingdoms’ plans for the Warborn?” This one would help him gauge who to keep an eye on, and who his next potential target could be.

“Vacuo wishes to open up trade with you, Atlas is currently amassing a fleet of warships in an attempt to liberate the oppressed people of Oblivion, and Vale has not yet decided, but is leaning more towards possible peace treaties.” Cainen thought about that. Atlas planning to attack them wasn’t a surprise, and if they were attacking only from the sky, then the mortars being built along the walls used to launch the same kinds of bombs Ares uses would be able to bring them down. And while they weren’t yet complete, as they were being built by hand, he could order Wolf to use his Semblance to speed up the process.

WIth his questions answered, Jinn dissolved into the Relic and time once again began moving, the lamp falling to the floor. He picked it up and set it on the counter, not worried about it being stolen since the security there was top notch. He grabbed his Scroll off his night stand and called Wolf, who answered after a few rings.

_ “I’m assuming it’s urgent?”  _ He sounded tired, but Cainen could hear talking in the background.

“What are you doing up so late?” He asked.

_ “I was informed of an intruder being caught in the Robotics Factory, and was just about to go in and interrogate him.”  _ Well, at least his guards weren't slacking off.

“Don’t worry, I’ll send Gage down to search his memories. The original reason I called you, Wolf, is because I just learned that Atlas is currently amassing a fleet of airships to attack the city, and I need you to help speed up the construction of the Mortars.”

Wolf chuckled, any tiredness in his voice now gone.  _ “I’ll get it done, sir.”  _ He hung up, and Cainen realized just how tired he was. It had been offset by the revelations he’d come to thanks to the Relic, but now he had to sleep. He sent Gage a quick message telling him about Wolf’s captive, then plopped back down on his bed, not even bothering to undress.

**A few days let, with a certain Maiden**

Astrea walked back to her home in Vale, the sun beginning to set, after having been gone for a while. Her long, black hair was braided and hung over her shoulder, and she planned on having it trimmed down a bit. She had been gone because, due to her being an ex-Institute Courser, she had taken up bounty hunting to get by. It wasn’t easy, but her skills made it not as difficult as it normally would be, not to mention how well it paid. Her most recent bounty had her hunting an escaped criminal who had been rejected from the Iron Wolves through the forest. It took her a while, but she tracked him down. She always did.

She pulled her keys out as she approached her house and unlocked the door, entering her home. She drew her weapons, a pair of high powered revolvers, and tossed them on the living room couch to put away later, along with the holsters. She noticed the heavy metal door to the basement was open, and she could hear noises coming from down the stairs. She peeked her head in, hearing mumbling alongside a hammer striking metal.

“Mason? You down there?” She called her boyfriend. He had been an escaped synth as well, though he’d been out a lot longer than her. He’d been originally living in the bunker where that teleporter was, and had been working on getting it up and running when she stumbled across him. Things had been a little tense when they first met, as Mason was a very paranoid person, a result of him taking a bullet to the head and miraculously surviving, though leaving him with a “fucked up brain”, as he put it, but they eventually got closer, and were now dating. He had also been a mechanic before escaping the Institute, and he’d used those skills to get the bunker up and running before fixing the teleporter working. Now he had a job as an independent mechanic, building and maintaining any equipment he was hired to.

“Yeah, it’s just me.” He called back up, the hammering stopping. He came around the corner and started coming up the stairs, compulsively popping his knuckles as he did so. He had a bandana around his neck and a pair of goggles on his head. When he reached the top of the stairs, he gave her a hug and kissed her on the forehead, him having the bend over a little due to him being a fair bit taller than her.

“How was your day today?” She asked, breaking away from the embrace. “You still working on that surprise for me?”

“What? Oh yeah, that! Yeah, it's almost done, and I’ll put the finishing touches on it tomorrow.” He walked into the kitchen, her following. As he looked through the fridge for anything they could have for dinner, he continued talking to her.

“I actually got a job from one of the Shade students. He’d fucked his weapon up so bad, he couldn’t fix it, so he brought it, and the original blueprints, to me.” He withdrew from the fridge carrying a bag of chopped up lettuce, put it on the counter, and started rifling through one of the cupboards.

“It took me I think four hours to fix the thing, and I got quite a bit of cash from it.” After a bit, he pulled out two cans of beans and set those down.

“You want Haystacks? We got the stuff for it.” He asked.

“Yeah, that sounds good. I’m gonna go take a shower.” She said before leaving for the bathroom.

“Ok.” He pulled out a pair of wireless earbuds in his pocket, put them in and started listening to metal while preparing food. He had recently discovered a band called Gojira, and was immediately in love. He was lightly humming while putting some rice in the rice-cooker, then started looking through the cupboards for the tortilla chips. Right as he moved his head to the side to look somewhere else, there was a gunshot and a bullet went right past his head. Acting on instinct, he grabbed a knife from the counter and spun around, swinging once at the same time.

He hit whoever had tried to shoot him in the throat, slashing it open. The attacker, who was dressed in all black with a black bandana and hoodie, dropped his rifle with wide eyes and clutched at his throat, gurgling. Mason quickly took his earbuds out and put them in his pocket just in time to hear Astrea scream from the bathroom. He rushed over to the hall, but saw a man standing outside, also dressed in black, and he shot at Mason the moment he saw him. Panicking, he ducked through the basement door, slamming it shut and locking it. The man banged on the door and shot it, but nothing went through the thick steel.

“Shit, he killed Kenney! Someone break this door down!” The man yelled on the other side. Mason ran downstairs, immediately rushing into his workshop. He’d wanted to wait to show Astrea the surprise, but now he had to pull it out early, whether he liked it or not.

Meanwhile, the thug shoulder bashed the door, but it wouldn’t budge.

“Cainen said we have to get both of them, so hurry up!” His buddy said from the bathroom, struggling with Astrea enough as it was. She had her Aura unlocked, but it seemed the guy attacking her did as well, as she was struggling to fight him off. The only reason she didn’t use her Maiden powers was because she didn’t want to give away the fact she was one. As the man continued to hit the door, he realized there were heavy footsteps coming up the stairs.

“You there, asshole?! I’ll kill you for-” He was cut off when the door exploded outward, a massive figure breaking it down with ease. Before he could see what it was, he felt a metallic hand grab him by the throat and throw him through a wall, the force knocking him out. The other guy, having been distracted, got kicked in the balls by a still struggling Astrea, then pushed through the doorway, though not knocking him off his feet. He looked over at where his buddy had been, and was surprised to see a large suit of black armor standing there, its eyes glowing red. He yelled and rushed at it, reeling back to hit it with an Aura-infused punch. Instead, the robot caught his fist, the metal hand not even flinching under his strength. It looked him in the eye and punched him in the face so hard his head exploded.

Astrea walked out of the bathroom in nothing but a towel, amazed to see who she thought was Mason in a suit of X-01 Power Armor, but then was confused when she saw him out of suit standing in front of the hole in the wall, grimacing at sight of the messed up thug.

“Mason!” She yelled, practically pouncing on him and hugging him. “I heard the gunshot and thought you were dead.” She said almost through tears.

“F-fucker nearly shot me, but I got lucky.” He quickly explained, clearly still shocked and gesturing to the dead thug in the kitchen. She pointed to the armor that was prodding the guy with its foot, checking to see if he was still alive.

“Is that what you were working on?” She asked, impressed, but not surprised, that he was able to build something like that.

“Yeah, he’s an AI controlled suit of Power Armor.” He said with a grin, clearly proud of his work. “His name’s Sam.” Sam looked up at them and gave them a two fingered salute before picking up the unconscious thug and carrying him into the living room, then promptly tying him up with a power cord. “I made his fists out of black market Anti-Aura material smuggled out of Oblivion and the rest of him with the strongest stuff I could get on Remnant. I also installed a personality core, which is why he acts more like a human than a robot. I was supposed to give him a voice tomorrow, but now I won’t have the time.”

“Well, I’m glad he works.” She said, walking into the living room and looking at the tied up attacker. “I heard one of them say Cainen sent them.” She told Mason, who’s eyes went wide.

“Cainen?! How the fuck does he know where we live?! That doesn’t make any sense, I just-” He was interrupted by Astrea pulling him in to a kiss, him quickly calming down. They separated and Mason sighed, moving his hand through his messy brown hair. “Thanks, I needed that.”

“Listen, I don’t know how he found us either, but we can’t stay here anymore.” She said with sadness in her voice.

“Yeah. Yeah, we gotta leave the city. You should probably get dressed while I deal with this guy.” She remembered she was only in a towel and her face went red before she rushed back to their room. He turned to the intruder and thought for a moment.

“What should we do with him?” He asked Sam. The robot walked back into the kitchen and picked up the rifle the attacker had been using. He checked it to make sure it was loaded, then shot the man in the head, the bullet going right through his Aura and killing him. Mason jumped back while Sam nodded in affirmation.

“W-well, at least we know they were using Anti-Aura.” Right then Astrea ran back into the living room wearing a casual black hoodie and jeans.

“What was that?” She asked, then saw the dead man on the couch and Sam holding the rifle and pieced it together.

“Wait, why don’t we just call the police? They’ll help us, right?” Mason asked.

“The Vale Council is seriously considering making peace with Oblivion. If anything, they’d just send us to him as a peace offering.” She countered.

“Oh yeah, I forgot about that.” He went back downstairs while Astrea approached Sam, who was still inspecting the rifle.

“Thanks for taking care of these guys.” She said, not really used to thanking a robot. He looked down at her and gave a thumbs up before going back to what he was doing. Mason came back up with a duffel bag in one hand and something wrapped in cloth in the other.

“Alright, I have my necessary stuff, I’m ready to go.” Before she could ask what it was, he unwrapped it, revealing it to be a modified plasma rifle. He tossed it to Sam, who dropped the poorer quality rifle and caught the far superior one. He examined it for a moment, taking the cartridge out and looking it over, before slapping it back in, nodding once and getting ready to leave.

“I have a lot more stuff to tell you, but I’ll do it once we’re out of the city, ok?” Mason said as he slung the bag across his back. Astrea nodded while grabbing her guns and holsters, strapping them on, then leaving with the other two, concealed by the darkness of night.


	12. Vita

The hired gun was thrown against the wall of Cainen’s throne room, causing him to yell in pain and spit out blood.

“It was one Huntress and her retarded boy toy, and you couldn’t even do that?!” Cainen had hired a gang of thugs to kill Astrea and Mason, only to learn from the lone survivor of the squad sent that they’d failed horribly, and now the pair had fled the city. “I even gave you Anti-Aura guns, and you still failed!” He kicked the groaning man in the gut while he was down, causing him to cough up even more blood.

“I saw em leaving with some guy in a huge suit of armor, we didn’t stand a chance!” The man pleaded, starting to stand, only to be helped by the large man grabbing him by the throat, his clawed gauntlets digging into his neck, and lifting him into the air.

“What did the armor look like?” He demanded.

“I-I got a picture of them, here.” He fished out his Scroll and opened up a picture. It had been taken through a window from the outside, and showed Astrea in the middle of talking to this mystery man, though the man was wearing some very familiar armor. A full suit of black X-01 Power Armor. The thug then flipped to a second picture, and this showed Mason tossing a plasma rifle to the armored behemoth.

Cainen sighed before setting the man down, who gasped for breath. He put his arm around the terrified man’s shoulder and started casually walking him to the exit, where a pair of Iron Wolves stood in wait.

“Maybe I was a bit too harsh. I’ve fought people in Power Armor before, and they’re tough sons of bitches.” He said as he led him on. The man didn’t know what he meant by Power Armor, but he nodded along anyway. “But that doesn’t mean failure can go unpunished.” He then thrusted his clawed hand through the man’s gut, allowing bodily fluids and guts to spill out. The man wasn’t even able to scream and just choked on his own blood. Cainen yanked his hand out, the man stumbling for a bit before collapsing, dead. The tyrant flicked some of the blood off of his hand before addressing his guards.

“One of you clean this mess up.” He ordered as he sat back on his throne.

“Right away, sir.” The one on the right went over to the corpse and slung it over his shoulders, clearly not caring about getting his armor bloody. Gage, who had been standing next to his throne, piped up.

“Well, what now boss?” Cainen thought for a moment, considering his options. Then his eyes lit up, and that all too familiar sadistic grin spread across his face once again.

“Bring Savoy up here. It’s time he went on a proper hunt, for once.”

**Meanwhile, with Astrea**

The group moved through the forest, having just snuck out of the city. It wasn’t easy with Sam, but they were able to make do. Night was beginning to fall, and they knew they had to make camp. They stopped at a spot a bit away from the road, but not so far that they’d get lost, and with help from Sam, they gathered some wood and started a small fire with Astrea’s Maiden powers. The couple were basking in the warmth of the flames together under a blanket Mason had packed while Sam patrolled around the area, watching for threats.

“So, you said there were some things about Sam you wanted to tell me about?” She asked, looking up at him.

“Oh yeah, I installed mods in his pieces. A put a targeting HUD in his helmet which lets him highlight living things, though I don’t know if it works on Grimm. There're motion-assist servos in his torso, so he’s way stronger than normal. Tesla bracers in his arms, so he’ll shock whatever he punches, and finally explosive vents in his legs so he can blow people up just by landing on them.” He explained.

“Just how long were you working on him?” She had no idea he had been kitted out with so much equipment.

“Ever since we moved to the old house, so quite a while.” She hummed in understanding before they fell back into silence. After a while, Astrea climbed on top of him and started kissing him deeply. Mason knew what she wanted, but wasn’t sure this was the best place. Regardless of what he thought, he found her irresistible, and so he let her continue as she slipped her shirt off.

Sam turned away from the two lovers and walked a bit further into the forest, intent on giving them some privacy. His plasma rifle was at the ready and he had a satchel of extra cartridges and grenades slung around his hip, so he was confident he could handle anything he came across. Earlier, he had examined the gun Mason had given him closer, and had discovered the rifle was heavily modified. An overcharged capacitor gave it a lot of kick, an improved automatic barrel allowed him to effectively spray and pray while still remaining fairly accurate, a recoil compensating stock further increased accuracy, and a reflex sight that was perfect for medium range combat encounters. Overall, it was a fairly impressive piece of weaponry, and he wasn’t surprised it had been produced by Mason’s skilled hands.

The robot was brought out of his thoughts by a Beowolf lunging out of the bushes, its highlighted form clearly visible. A reflexive punch caused its head to explode and made its brains splatter against the trees. At least now he knew that the targeting HUD also applied to Grimm. He was surprised it hadn’t announced its presence, like most young Beowolves did, but he shrugged it off. Stranger things have probably happened, not he’s encountered any.

Not detecting any further threats in the area, Sam laid down in the soft grass, though he couldn’t feel it, and looked up at the stars. This was the first time he’d ever been out of the basement, let alone the city. He felt a moment of frustration at Mason for keeping him there, but the emotion was fleeting, as he understood why he had kept him there. For one, his body wasn’t even complete, and even now, he couldn’t speak verbally. He had also not wanted to bring attention to him and his love through the public knowledge of Sam, though he wondered how he’d explain away his existence to the next town they came across.

He was also fully sentient. He had the option of leaving the pair alone in the woods if he really wanted to, as there was nothing forcing him to be there. He could explore Remnant to his heart’s content, maybe even discovering never before seen places in the deepest parts of the wilderness in the process. But he couldn’t. He considered Mason a friend, and what kind of friend abandons their comrades, especially given the fact they were being hunted by the leader of the Warborn.

He laid there for who knows how long, and upon not hearing them anymore, he stood back up and looked back, seeing them sleeping peacefully under the blanket. He walked back over to the campsite and sat down next to the dying fire, staring into the smoldering embers before eventually shutting down to conserve power.

The next morning, Mason and Astrea munched on berries as they were walking down the road. Sam had scanned them and deemed them to be safe, so they didn’t hesitate to eat them. As they walked, Astrea glanced over at Mason, concerned. He was good at hiding it, but she could tell he was stressed to hell and back about everything that’s happened. The main thing that gave it away was his little tics being amplified, such as flexing his jaw and popping his joints. He’d do that regardless of his mood, but this time it seemed more intense than before. He’d almost died just the previous day, so she couldn’t blame him, but she just hoped he could calm down at some point.

They’re attention was taken by a rapid series of beeps coming behind them. They turned around and realized Sam’s eyes were beginning to flicker, indicating low power.

“Shit, I thought these things were supposed to last longer.” Mason grumbled as he unzipped his duffel bag. “Hold on.” He fished out another fusion core and disappeared behind the large robot. There was the sound of gasses escaping followed by pressurization, and Sam jolted up, fully back to normal. Mason came back with the empty core in his hand, frowning.

“I’d forgotten to swap out the old one beforehand. This’s been in his frame for a while, as it was the one I used when I was testing him, since I made his frame about as energy efficient as possible.” He put it in his bag to be properly disposed of later, and they continued onward.

“Did you have that bag pre packed? Because there’s no way you could’ve filled it as quickly as it looked.” Astrea asked as she eyed the bag curiously.

“I’ve had it ready since we moved to Vale in case of a situation like this. Guess my paranoia counts for something.” He grinned a little before zipping the bag shut, and they continued in silence.

Mason pulled out his Scroll and checked the map. The nearest town, a place called Vita, was only a mile away now, and it looked like the perfect place to move to. It was small and surrounded by the vast Emerald Forest, and nobody really knew how they hadn’t been whipped out by Grimm yet, but it seemed all they really needed to survive was their wall and each other. He had enough Lien in the bag to get a new place for them, and it was remote enough that most people wouldn’t go there to look for them, plus they could go back to their regular jobs just like before.

As they neared, they spotted something up ahead that made their blood run cold. Smoke. There was only one smoke column, but it still meant danger. Before either of them could react, Sam bolted ahead, his instinct to protect going wild and causing him to leave the others behind.

He rapidly reached the intact gate and smashed through it with little resistance. He emerged from the other side, and realized this was the early stage of a Grimm attack, as the damages seemed to be very minimal. He saw a woman burst out of a nearby house, a Beowolf hot on her tail. It was about to bisect her, but he filled its body with plasma, killing it quickly. Before she could thank what she thought was a Huntsman, he dashed off as he heard more yelling.

He rounded a street and saw a large man with a flail and shield doing battle with a particularly large Ursa. He wore a suit of heavy metal armor, though he lacked a helmet. He looked older and his face had a greying beard along with a scar going down his left eye. Sam assumed the man was a Huntsman and began charging towards him. The man saw Sam coming and grinned. He pushed the Ursa back with his shield, allowing Sam to shoulder bash it with enough force to completely knock it off its feet. Taking advantage of its lack of proper footing, Sam crushed its head with his mechanical foot, ending the threat.

“You couldn’t have chosen a better time to show up.” The older man laughed. Sam looked over at him and silently nodded, not able to verbally respond.

“Not much of a talker, eh? That’s fine with me, since you can kick Grimm ass.” He flung the ball up and grabbed the chain at the same time, preventing any risk of him hitting himself as he moved.

“We got two issues. There’s a big bloody hole in the northern part of the wall where the Grimm are getting through, and the remaining Grimm are attacking the Town Hall where the civilians are taking shelter. Now, I can’t be in two places at once, so I need you to take care of those Grimm while I guard the breach and make sure no more of the fuckers get through, alright?” Sam nodded.

“Good. The hall is just that way.” He pointed to the right, and he saw the large building much further down the road, though it was just the right side of it. He gave the Huntsman a two fingered salute and sprinted for the building. He was glad for the upgrades Mason had made to his frame, as the new fusion core hadn’t even gone below 95% yet, even with all the physical strain he was going through.

He circled the building and found the front entrance along with a pack of three Beowolves, one of which he recognized as an Alpha, trying to claw their way inside. He could also hear the screams of terror coming from the people inside, trapped inside the building that was meant to protect them. He wanted to throw a grenade to kill them all at once, but he didn’t want to risk destroying the door. He opted to just open fire on the pack, killing the one closest to him and hitting the Alpha in the shoulder. The other minor Beowolf charged him, and Sam eliminated it with a single shot to the head. However, it provided just enough distraction for the Alpha to flank around the robot and take a swing at him. It knocked the rifle out of his hands and then tried to bite his head, though it ended up clamping down on his left bracer.

It struggled to chew through the reinforced metal, only being able to barely scratch the black paint, and Sam’s strength was able to hold it back. He reached into his satchel and revealed a frag grenade before shoving it in the beast’s mouth, causing it to swallow it. He then kicked it back and stood up. The Grimm coughed and gagged for a moment before the device detonated, blowing the once mighty creature into meaty chunks. It covered the surrounding area, including Sam, in black blood and organs, but it all began to rapidly dissolve, and it soon looked like nothing had happened. Sam went over to where his rifle had been swatted, picked it up and inspected it for damage. Luckily it was still operational, and any marks could easily be buffed out by Mason.

Sam brought his attention back to the door, and realized the door hadn’t actually been that badly damaged by the Grimm’s claws, aside from the scratch marks. It made him wonder if the grenade would’ve actually destroyed it. He slowly opened it and poked his head through. He saw a large group of people, all dressed like civilians, huddling together in groups. As soon as they saw him, there was a collective sigh of relief, and they happily left once Sam opened the door fully.

After the rest of the civilians had left, someone who he assumed to be the mayor followed behind them. He wore a black suit, though it was slightly damaged by recent events. His hair was a light blonde and went down to his shoulders, and his green eyes looked at his with relief, though his most prominent feature was the pair of golden lion ears poking out of his hair. He approached the armored behemoth and greeted him.

“Thank Ohm you came, I was worried old Wilhelm wouldn't be able to handle all the Grimm alone.” He chuckled a little and smiled before extending his hand. “I’m Alex Dux, the mayor of Vita.” Sam shook his hand, careful to not crush his hand with his massive mechanical hands. “And what’s your name? It would be good to have something to address you by.” Sam indicated to his throat and shook his head, causing Alex to raise an eyebrow.

“Are you mute?” Sam nodded, but before they could continue, someone sprinted up to them. Two someones, in fact. Mason had his hands on his knees for a moment while Astrea looked barely winded.

“Don’t ever do that again.” Mason gasped out, pointing to the iron giant. Sam scratched the back of his head, unable to explain himself.

“Do you know him?” Alex asked as he turned to the pair.

“Yeah.” Astrea joined in the conversation. “I’m Astrea, I’m a bounty hunter, this is Mason, he’s my boyfriend and a mechanic.” Mason waved, still very out of breath. “And this big guy who saved you is Sam.” Alex smiled as he shook her hand.

“Well, it’s a pleasure to meet you. I should introduce you to Wilhelm the next chance we get, assuming Sam hasn’t already run into him.” Right on cue, the resident Huntsman burst out of an alleyway, this time with a helmet. It was forged of black iron, just like the rest of his armor, and had the visage of a skull for a faceplate.

“Speak of the Devil!” Alex exclaimed.

“We’ve got a problem.” Wilhelm said, taking off his helmet. “You friends with him?” He asked the two.

“Yeah, we just managed to catch up.” Mason explained, having finally caught his breath.

“Good, follow me and I’ll explain on the way.” He put his helmet back on and ran in the other direction. Sam and Astrea ran with him, though Mason stayed for a moment.

“Oh for fucks sake.” He groaned before taking off after them, still hefting the heavy bag. As they ran, Wilhelm explained the situation.

“There’s a huge Deathstalker coming right for us, the biggest I’ve ever seen. If we don’t stop it, it’ll go right through the wall and destroy the town.” They arrived at the hole, not a large one, but just big enough for an Ursa to squeeze through, and just like he’d said, they could see the stinger of a huge Deathstalker poking out of the forest canopy. And it was rapidly getting closer.

“I already know-” Wilhelm stopped himself when he realized he didn’t actually know the larger man’s name.

“He’s Sam, and he’s mute, I’m Astrea, and he’s Mason.” Astrea quickly explained.

“Thank you. I already know Sam can fight, but what about you two?”

“I’m a bounty hunter with Huntress training.” Astrea said as she drew her revolvers and loaded them with a variety of Dust rounds. “I’m pretty sure I can fight.”

“I-I’m no good at fighting, I just build and maintain things.” Mason said, dropping the duffel bag and handing Sam a nuka grenade, the only one he had. “Save this for a last resort.” Sam nodded and put it in his satchel.

“Alright. Sam, Astrea, you come with me and help me take this big bastard down. Mason, you stay behind and see what you can do about the hole.”

“Gotcha.” Mason moved the bag within the walls and started examining the hole, trying not to be distracted by the large beast coming straight for them.

“Alright, let’s do this.” Wilhelm said as he got in a combat stance, his shield raised and twirling his mace to get some momentum going, while Sam and Astrea aimed their respective weapons at the treeline.

Then the massive beast burst out of the forest, shrieking so loud the people at the Town Hall could hear it. Wilhelm hadn’t been exaggerating when he said it was huge. It towered over them, and was about a quarter bigger than a Super Mutant Behemoth, with claws as long as a Behemoth club. They eyed each other up for a bit before Sam fired a shot at one of its many eyes, causing it to burst in a spray of black blood. It shrieked, this time in pain, and charged forward to battle, and Wilhelm released his own battle cry and charged forward, shield still raised, as Sam and Astrea flanked the beast.

The beast went to stab Wilhelm, but he parried it to the side with his shield and bashed the exposed tail with his flail. His Aura-enhanced strength allowed him to embed the spiked ball in the creature’s tail, then rip it out, causing it to scream in extreme pain. It tried to pull away, but its tail was stuck in the ground, so Wilhelm continued wailing on it with wild abandon. It swiped at him with its pincers, knocking him away, but the damage had been done, and when it tried again to pull its tail out of the ground, it had been so severely damaged that the stinger didn’t go with the tail, and remained buried in the ground while the tail sprayed blood.

Sam fired at its front, aiming for the eyes, while Astrea went behind it to look for a weak spot. Unfortunately, its carapace was too thick for either of their projectiles to penetrate, and Sam’s plasma shots were too slow to be able to hit the moving eyes. Sam’s plasma cartridge went dry, and as soon as the stream of green projectiles stopped, the Deathstalker launched both of its pincers forward. Sam was forced to drop his rifle and use both his hands to hold the claws at bay. Even with his enhanced strength, he struggled to hold them back, and he was glad Wilhelm had already taken care of the scorpion’s stinger, as this would’ve been the perfect opportunity to skewer him.

Sam heard a yell behind him, and saw as Wilhelm charged back into the fray, using his momentum and shield to bash one of the pincers away from Sam. With only one pincer against him, he was able to focus all of his strength on the offending limb and push it into the ground, getting it stuck. He then jumped on top of its arm and started running along it toward the body. The Deathstalker saw him and tried to bat him off with its tail, but he ducked under it and used the momentum to jump over, landing on one of its eyes, crushing it. He ripped his boot out of the socket and grabbed the monster’s upper jaw as it screeched in pain. He pulled out the Nuka Grenade Mason had given him, intent on doing to it what he’d done to the Beowolf Alpha just 15 minutes earlier. Unfortunately, he didn’t see the tail coming back around for another go, and was swatted off, dropping the grenade in the process.

He hit the ground hard, and silently thanked Mason for not giving him pain receptors, as he was sure it would’ve hurt like hell. He got to his feet and looked for the device. He spotted it on the ground a fair ways away from him, but the Deathstalker was now practically on top of it, unintentionally guarding it. Astrea looked over at him, and he pointed to the explosive, then to where his mouth would be. Astrea understood, and went into action.

Astrea used her Semblance, Bullet Time, to temporarily slow down the speed of everything around her. It was extremely useful, but she didn’t use it often since it was very taxing on her Aura and her body. She ran and slid under the Deathstalker, grabbing the grenade as she did so, then climbed on top of the beast, only to realize she had chosen a bad time, as its maw was shut.

She stopped her Semblance, and it took her every ounce of balance not to be thrown off. It shreaked in defiance, and she used that moment of vulnerability to pull the pin on the grenade and toss it into the scorpion’s mouth. She jumped off just in time to dodge a pincer swipe and ran back over to where Sam and Wilhelm were.

“What did you do?” The veteran Huntsman asked.

“Just wait.” Astrea said with a smirk as she holstered her revolvers. It began to charge at them, and Wilhelm raised his shield. Suddenly, the beast blew up in a spectacular explosion, sending meat chunks everywhere and leaving behind nothing but a mushroom cloud and a small crater.

“Holy shit!” Wilhelm exclaimed with a laugh. “What kind of explosive was that?!”

“One of a kind.” Astrea responded before walking back over to Mason. Sam retrieved his rifle, still barely scratched, slapped in a fresh cartridge, before following them. As they neared the hole, Mason appeared from around the corner, looking nervous.

“Hey guys, I think I figured out what caused the hole.” He said, also sounding nervous.

“Well? What beast managed to break through?” Wilhelm asked as he took off his helmet and tucked it under his arm.

“This wasn’t Grimm.” He said as he pointed to the edges of the hole, and they saw what he was talking about. They were subtle, and they wouldn’t have spotted it had Mason not pointed it out, but there were small scorch marks along the edge, indicating an explosion.

“This was deliberate sabotage.”


	13. A Little Lesson In Trickery

The day after they’d defended Vita from the Grimm, Mason was hard at work in the basement of their new home fixing up Sam’s rifle. After they had helped defend the town, they informed Mayor Dux of their interest in moving here, and the kind man was all too happy to provide them with a vacant home, free of charge. The previous family had moved out some time ago, and there simply were not enough people in Vita to fill the vacancy, and they’d left most of their furniture here. Mason had immediately set up shop in the roomy basement, as it was twice as large as the one form their old home, and started working on their equipment. He had wanted to repair any damage Sam might have sustained, but since the worst of it was a dent in his shoulder from smashing through the gate, Sam was fine with waiting.

But as he repaired the plasma rifle, something occupied his mind. Ever since he’d escaped from the Institute, he’d been running and hiding like a mouse being chased by a cat, even more so since he’d gotten together with Astrea, and he was getting sick of it. He was a master mechanic who could build anything from various weapons to a sentient suit of Power Armor, and yet here he was, cowering like some damn coward. He was so absorbed in his thoughts and the music coming through his earbuds, he didn’t notice as someone walked down the stairs and behind them. Someone tapped his shoulder and he turned around to see Astrea looking up at him, a big smile on her face. He took out one of his earbuds so he could talk to her.

“Hey, what’s got you in such a good mood?” He asked.

“ _ I  _ just became the town’s second ever resident Huntress!” She said happily, practically bouncing in place. “Even though I don’t have a license, Alex figured I was skilled enough to handle it anyway. The pay’s way better than in Vale and, with the bigger missions, I’ll be working with Wilhelm.” She pulled him into a kiss while giggling, and Mason’d be lying if he said her happiness wasn’t rubbing off on him, even if just a little bit.

“That’s great!” He congratulated, pulling away from the kiss. “When’s your first mission?”

“It’s tomorrow. There’s a pack of Beowolves that are getting too close for comfort, and it’ll be my job to kill them.” She said, the big grin still plastered across her face.

“Nice. Hey, I gotta get back to fixing up Sam’s rifle. It took a few hits from yesterday.”

“Oh yeah, sure.” She gave him another peck on the lips before going back upstairs. After she’d gone, his smile slowly faded and he sighed.

“Alright, let’s get this over with.” He mumbled to himself as he turned back to his work.

**Sam POV**

Sam had been given the job of manning the front gate, especially since it needed to be repaired after he’d bashed his way through it. Luckily, none of the construction workers were upset about it, and it was only a relatively small hole that could be repaired easily. He would just have to protect them as they did so.

He hadn’t noticed when he first arrived here, but there were walkways along the top of the wall you could use to patrol from above. There had been a number of guards to patrol the wall, so Sam had decided to take the job of patrolling the wall above the gate. And since his rifle was currently being repaired by Mason, he had to use one of the standard issue rifles the guards typically used, though that wasn’t much of an issue.

As he stared out over the forest, he heard someone clear their throat behind him in a clear attempt at garnering his attention. He turned around and saw a young girl, likely a teenager, standing there while holding something behind her back. She had shoulder length brown hair and was wearing a blank black tank top with jeans.

“My mom says you saved her during the attack, so she made something for you.” She revealed what was in her hands, and it was a small stuffed toy of him, rifle and all. She gave it to him, and his surprise must have been very apparent, even through his lack of face.

“My mom’s really good at making plushies, so she made one of you.” Sam was impressed by how quickly it was made, especially considering the level of detail. You could see the individual joints on his robotic fingers as well as the grooves in the tubes on the rifle. The toy was about 13 cm tall and fit in his hand nicely. He nodded at her, gave her a thumbs up and slipped it in his satchel. He knew just what he was gonna do with it later.

“You’re welcome. You’re probably busy, so I’ll leave you be.” She smiled a bit and walked down the stairs back to the ground. Little did he know that something was tracking them, and was close to finding them.

**A few miles away**

Savoy sniffed through the old campsite. There was nothing there except a long-dead fire, but he could still smell them in the air. The area reeked of sex, which made it easier to lock on to their scent. His armored claws sank into the dirt as he sniffed the air, trying to determine which direction they went. He was able to catch their trail, but upon looking at the ground, he realized scent would be unnecessary, as he could clearly see the telltale boot prints of Power Armor. He followed the trail until he spotted a town ahead, and he ducked into the treeline.

He continued to follow the trail, and realized it went right into the town. The sign next to the gate called this place “Vita”, and he had no doubts this was where they were hiding. Since his armor had been completely painted, he could more easily hide in the darkness of the trees, and watched with great interest as a man in a suit of black X-01 Power Armor patrolled the wall, while construction workers repaired a hole in the gate. Savoy knew his prey was hiding in the town, but he still had to decide whether to go inside and hunt them directly, or wait for them to inevitably leave and catch them then.

He stalked around the town, looking for any weaknesses, when he found a large, glaring one. A hole just big enough for him to fit through, even with his armor, had been blasted in the wall. Unfortunately, an alarm had been set up right next to the hole, and he doubted he would be able to get there before anybody spotted him.

He circled back to the front of the town and sat there until nightfall, when the workers left for their home and the man in the Power Armor was replaced by a regular guard for the night shift. He was about to consider climbing the wall when he noticed something that piqued his curiosity. Two people, both teenagers, were sneaking out of the town. They snuck up onto the top of the wall, and the boy jumped first, landing with a roll. When the girl jumped, he caught her before they ran into the forest. Figuring it’d been a while since he’d had a snack, he silently followed them as they ran, giggling through the forest.

Eventually they came upon a clearing and layed down in the grass, looking up at the stars. Now that they were illuminated, he could see who they were. The girl he remembered seeing talking with the Power Armor man before, and the boy looked like the typical emo teenager. They were idly chatting, and he was astonished by their lack of caution. Then he saw the boy pull out two Jet inhalers from his pocket, handing one to the girl, and he knew why. They laid back in the grass and continued their conversation. That was when Savoy made his presence known. He slowly skulked out of the bushes, growling and snarling. They looked back at him and shot up, both their faces paler than the shattered moon above them.

“Oh shit, no!” The girl cried out, already beginning to freak out. “I knew this was a bad idea!” She began looking around frantically, but couldn’t find a way to escape. That was when the boy piped up.

“Wait a minute, I know who you are.” He said, now infinitely more terrified. Savoy chuckled deeply.

**“Do you now?”** He began to move in circles around them, making them feel trapped.  **“And who am I?”**

The boy gulped before answering. “You’re Savoy, the Blood Hound of the Disciples.” The girl was totally paralyzed with fear by now, and wasn’t paying attention to anything except the bloodthirsty monster taunting them. “I know you because the Iron Wolves said I could join them if I brought my town down.” Now that gave him pause. He hadn’t heard of this, so it was likely the kid had been tricked by some Wolves just looking for a kick, and didn’t have any plans to actually let him join. But his willingness to help the Warborn could be useful.

**“In that case, you may be of some use to me.”** The fear in the boy’s eyes decreased at the prospect of being spared.

“I’ll do anything, just don’t kill me.” He pleaded. Right after saying that, Savoy lunged at the girl, who looked like she was about to run. He slashed at her stomach, drawing blood but not enough to cause her guts to spill out. He would’ve finished the job, but she wisely played dead, and he ignored her. He turned over to the boy, his claws soaked in blood, and his face was locked in one of horror.

**“I am hunting a woman and her boyfriend, Astrea and Mason. If you can convince Astrea to ‘hunt’ me, alone, then I will take you back to Oblivion to present to General Wolf himself.”** He proposed. The boy, realizing he was in no position to negotiate, nodded frantically.

“Yeah, I’ll lure her out here, whatever you say.” He sounded like he was about to hyperventilate. That was good, as the frantic mood would make what he said to her seem more genuine.

**“Then go, tell her you saw a large Beowolf kill your friend, and she will undoubtedly come running.”** After that, the boy ran off back to town to fetch the Maiden, while Savoy watched from the shadows.

This was going far better than he’d thought it would.

**Back in the town**

Astrea was rudely awoken by her Scroll ringing on her nightstand. Still half asleep, she cursed herself for forgetting to put it on silent before picking it up and walking out into the hall. She checked the number, and was surprised to see it was the Police Chief, Kurt. It must’ve been an emergency if he was calling her at this hour. She answered it and placed it to her ear.

“Mmmm, hello?” She groaned, still very tired.

_ “Oh thank Ohm. After Wilhelm didn’t pick up, I was worried you wouldn’t either.”  _ The man said, slightly panicked. Upon hearing his tone, her brow furrowed in slight concern.

“What’s wrong? Did something happen?” She asked, her words a little slurred.

_ “Yeah, one of the kids, the emo one, Eugene, came in saying he and Max had snuck out into the forest to do what horny teenagers do, when they were attacked by a huge Beowolf. He was barely able to escape while Max was left behind.” _ Right as he said that, Astrea’s eyes went wide and she sprinted to get her equipment. She recognized that name. Max was the girl who gave Sam that plushie her mom had made for him. She was so dead set on finding the Beowolf that’d done this that she never thought to get Sam.

“Did he say where?” She asked quickly, her mind going into overdrive.

_ “Yeah, they went to a clearing just North-East of here.” _

“Alright, thanks. I’ll get right on it.” She dashed out the door, her clothes on and her revolvers holstered at her hip, and began sprinting in the direction of the clearing. She climbed up the steps of the wall and jumped off the other side, letting her Aura take the hit, and continued running. She drew her revolvers in preparation of a fight and burst into the clearing. She immediately saw Max laying in the grass, seemingly dead. She rushed over to her and saw the bloody gashes on her abdomen.

“No no no, shit!” She checked for a pulse, but as soon as she touched her, her eyes shot open and she gasped. She clutched her hand in a death grip.

“I-it’s a t-trap. Eugene t-tricked you.” She struggled out before coughing up blood. Upon hearing this, Astrea realized her mistake and called Mason, who immediately picked up.

_ “Astrea?! Why the hell did you leave the house like that?!”  _ She must've woken him up, but that was good.

“Listen, Max’s boyfriend, Eugene, tricked Kurt into sending me out here for some reason. Max is here and she’s pretty badly wounded, but alive. Get Sam and follow my Scroll’s GPS, then-” She was cut off by something slamming into her skull hard enough to knock her out cold.

_ “Astrea? Astrea?!”  _ Mason yelled in worry after hearing the wet thud. After a second of silence, he heard a blood curdling scream that didn’t sound like Astrea’s before a horrible tearing sound. Then a voice answered.

**_“So that’s your buddy’s name?”_ ** Was the last thing Mason heard before he heard the telltale  _ bang  _ of a teleportation before the line went dead. He had already been fully dressed when Astrea had called him, and now he knew she was in trouble. He ran downstairs where Sam had just finished hanging his plushie around his satchel.

“Astrea and Max are in trouble, we need to go!” Mason grabbed his bag while Sam grabbed his rifle and they both booked it. They took the same path as Astrea, but when they reached the clearing, they stopped in shock. Astrea was gone and Max was lying in the grass, her stomach torn open and her intestines spilling out. Sam dropped his rifle and sprinted over before kneeling over her, his hands on his head in clear panic. She was just barely alive as tears streamed down her face and her breaths came out bloody and raggedy.

“I don’t wanna die.” She pleaded over and over while gripping Sam’s cold hand. Her pleads became weaker and weaker until the light left her eyes and she went limp. Sam shook her, but knew it was useless. He wanted nothing more than to scream in rage, but since he couldn’t he opted to punch a nearby tree so hard his fist destroyed the wood.

“I can’t believe it.” Mason said, also panicking. “That fucking kid, Eugene, tricked her. Why?” Upon hearing the name, Sam saw red and charged back to the town, intent on tearing the kid limb from limb, while Mason followed.

Sam was ready to rip and tear.


	14. Heed My Words

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Important notice: I’ve recently been given the green light to head back to work, which means updates will be significantly longer to write. And since I’m a warehouse worker, there’s no option for me to work from home at all. But that doesn’t mean I’m gonna be quitting or going on hiatus, at least not anytime soon.

Kurt watched from the observation room as Eugene was questioned by one of his officers. The poor kid had just about been killed by a Grimm, and his girlfriend very well could have died. He looked genuinely horrified by what had happened, which led everyone to treat him with some empathy. It was just him in the room, as it was still late at night and everyone else was, understandably, asleep. As Eugene was questioned, Kurt got a message on his Scroll. He took a look and saw it was from Mason, Astrea’s boyfriend. He read it, and his heart dropped.

_ “Astrea’s been kidnapped. Her last words over the Scroll was that Eugene worked with the kidnapper to trick and capture her, not to mention Max is dead.”  _ Kurt glanced over at Eugene, doubtful of this.

_ “Do you know how she knew?”  _ He asked. He didn’t really have any reason to be distrustful of the bounty hunter, but he had to be sure.

_ “Max was still alive when she got there, she told her. Look, you need to secure Eugene because Sam is on a goddamn warpath and is gonna rip him in half for this.”  _ Kurt’s eyes went wide but before he could so anything he heard a loud crash from the front door. He ran out of the observation room with his gun drawn and saw the iron giant himself standing in the doorway, though the doors had been smashed off their hinges. His red glowing eyes were brighter than normal and his fists were clenched tight. He’d probably be roaring in rage if he wasn’t mute. He saw where Kurt had come from, put two and two together, and marched over to the door to the interrogation room, his mechanical boots pounding on the ground. Kurt knew there was nothing he could do to stop Sam, and so didn’t try.

Sam tried the door handle, and when he saw it was locked, kicked it open. It flew off its hinges and hit the interrogating officer, knocking him out cold. Eugene was backed into a corner as he looked death in the eyes.

“I-I didn’t mean to.” Sam stomped toward him, throwing the table to the side as he did so. When he was within arm’s reach, he grabbed the scrawny kid by the throat and lifted him into the air. The kid tried to defend himself by hitting his arm, but Sam couldn’t even feel it. His attempts to free himself were in vain as Sam tightened his grip, intent on crushing the life out of him. Right as he started to black out, Mason ran into the room.

“Sam, stop!” Sam’s grip eased and he looked at him as if to ask “Why should I?”

“I know you’d like nothing more than to kill him, but we need to figure out who it was that took Astrea, and we can’t do that if the only person who knows is dead.” Mason pleaded. Sam turned back to look at Eugene, and after some hesitation, dropped him to the floor. He gasped for air and held his throat, still looking at the man who had tried to kill him with fear.

“Good. Now, tell me who took Astrea, or I’ll give my friend here the go ahead to crush your skull.” Mason said as he kept the emo cornered. Eugene looked around frantically and saw Kurt standing in the doorway, though any empathy he’d held for him was now replaced by disdain and hatred.

“It was Savoy, the Beowolf that works for the Warborn!” As soon as he said that, Sam punched him in the head, knocking him to the floor while clutching his head.

“Shit, of course it’d be the Warborn.” Mason cursed under his breath. That meant they couldn’t stay here anymore, not unless they wanted to put the people living here in danger.

“There’s something I have to do.” Mason addressed Sam. “Meet me at home after you’re done with this piece of shit.” He snarled at Eugene before walking out, leaving the kid all alone with a murderous beast.

Sam picked him up by his leg and threw him across the room, causing him to impact the opposite wall with quite a bit of force. He cried out in pain and tried to scramble away, but Kurt had left the room, locking the door behind him. As he tried the doorknob, Sam grabbed his hand and squeezed as hard as he could. He screamed in pain as his hand was reduced to bloody mush and shattered bones before being punched so hard he temporarily forgot the pain. He went tumbling across the floor and looked up just in time to see a chair hurtling towards him. One of the legs hit him in the mouth, taking out his front teeth. He continued screaming in agony even as the iron giant stomped on both of his legs hard enough to severe them at the knees. He then grabbed him by the sides of his head and lifted him into the air, his legs spewing blood.

“Please! Someone help!” Sam ignored his pleas for mercy by taking his metal thumbs and slowly driving them into the kid’s eyes. Eugene screamed even louder, and Sam thought for a moment that he’d shatter the window. He gave him mercy when, in a show of strength, he split his skull in half, spilling out his grey matter and silencing his voice. Sam dropped his corpse with a wet  _ splat _ and left by kicking the door open. Kurt was nowhere to be seen, nor were any other officers, all having turned a blind eye to the criminal’s gruesome death.

As Sam left and began making his way back home, his gauntlets and boots still soaked in blood, he thought about how people would say killing the person who wronged you wouldn’t make you feel better. He would have to disagree, as he hadn’t felt this good since the death of the Deathstalker. He realized he had a taste for blood, and he knew just how to quench it.

**Back with Mason**

The genius mechanic had just finished getting things ready when Sam arrived in the basement, covered in blood. There was a large chair in the center of the room with multiple machines attached to it, and Mason beckoned for Sam to sit.

“It’s time I gave you a voice.” He said, sounding almost dead inside. Sam nodded and sat down after leaving his rifle on a nearby table, leaving bloody footprints between the chair and the stairs. “Once this is done you’ll have a default voice, but will be able to change and distort it in whatever way you want.” Sam sat down in the reinforced chair and Mason began hooking up various wires and equipment to his neck area.

Sam shut down so as to reduce the risk of accidentally shorting something out, and Mason got to work. Mason deactivated the clamps holding the helmet in place, attached a weak magnet to the top and lifted it up hands free, revealing the internal circuitry that made up the robot. The main circuitry, such as the neural core, was contained in the chest area where it was protected by the thickest of the armor. There wasn’t much circuitry in the helmet aside from the optical and auditory sensors, so there wasn’t much risk of damaging anything vital.

He spotted the place where he’d started work on the voice box but never finished, just below the neck and partially in the chest. It was already set up, he’d just have to attach the voice box itself to the mount and then activate it. Then he’d be able to assign the voice he’d created via the computer he had hooked up. He grabbed the black cylinder from his desk and began placing it within the mount. The voice box had a dual purpose. Along with giving him a voice, it was also programmed to secretly record everything Sam saw and heard in case he was destroyed or disabled in any way. It would also be a fail safe in case he suspected Sam of betraying them. He felt guilty even thinking Sam would do something like that, but he hadn’t survived this long by trusting people.

He attached the device to the mount and saw the small light in the center turn green, indicating it was ready to be used. He reattached Sam’s head and reactivated the clamps. He turned to his computer and opened up the voice box’s program. He chose the default voice he’d created and activated it, along with the device. After a few seconds of it booting up and syncing to the neural core, the voice box had been fully attached and was now fully ready to be used. Mason detached the wires from Sam’s head and reactivated him. Sam’s eyes flickered as he woke up and he rubbed the area on his chest where the voice box was.

“Alright, it should be working now.” Mason said as he walked around in front of the large robot. “Try using it.”

Sam stood there for a second as all that came out was garbled static. The device must’ve still been syncing. Suddenly Sam’s eyes flashed and his head twitched slightly.

_ “Is it working now?”  _ He finally spoke, that familiar radio effect coming through because of the speaker. His voice was low and gravelly, as was the intention to make him even more intimidating, but somehow equally friendly if used in the right tone. Sam jumped slightly in surprise as he heard himself talk for the first time.  _ “Holy shit, it actually works. I can say shit now.”  _ He chuckled lightly and rubbed his throat a bit.

“I’m just glad it didn’t explode or anything.” Mason sighed with relief, smiling a little. Though the smile didn’t last long as there was a crash upstairs followed by yelling. Sam growled in anger.

_ “I hope it’s his friends.”  _ He said with bloodlust dripping from his voice. Mason already knew who he was talking about, and decided to just wait downstairs while Sam went to work.

Sam decided to leave his rifle in the basement as he made his way up the steps. Right as he reached the top, someone wielding a shotgun kicked the door open, only to be met by a mechanical punch. The punch obliterated his jaw and sent him to the floor, the blow knocking him out, though he’d undoubtedly die of blood loss before long.

He turned to the left in the direction of the living room and saw three more older men, all armed with various types of scatterguns and surrounding the entrance to the hall. It was likely one of them was Eugene’s father, and he’d gathered some of his buddies to kill the robot, though he couldn’t tell who it was. They all pointed their guns at him and the one in the middle of the three shouted at him.

“You killed my fucking son, you bastard!” He yelled in rage and barely controlled fear. Lightning flashed from outside, as it had begun to storm, and the lights in the house went out. It made Sam’s glowing eyes all the more terrifying.

_ “He didn’t deserve to live, and the same goes for the rest of you.”  _ He said, artificially making his voice slightly lower. The men were shocked by his ability to speak, and didn’t react in time when he suddenly surged towards them, bashing them out of the way with a shoulder charge. He spun to his left and stomped on the leg of one of the men, shattering it, before doing the same to his skull. By that point, the other man had gotten up and shot him in the back. All they did was ping off his back.

He turned around and grabbed the barrel of the gun, and double barrel, then pushed it back so the butt smashed into his face, knocking him back and removing his grip. His nose was a bloody mess and he yelled in pain, holding his face. Sam turned the gun around and attempted to shoot him, but all he got was an empty  _ click  _ as the shells had already been spent. Improvising, Sam flipped the gun around so he was holding it by the barrel and used it like a bat to smash his head in. After the butt was soaked in blood and he’d stopped moving, Sam turned his attention to the father.

He was sitting against the wall, holding his stomach in pain as he’d taken the brunt of the shoulder charge. Sam grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and dragged him over to the window overlooking the front lawn. It was really pouring now and he saw a few cars outside, undoubtedly belonging to the scumbags that were at his mercy. He ignored the father's pleas for mercy and threw him through the glass, shattering it and sending him rolling across the soaked ground.

Sam slammed the front door open hard enough to splinter the wood as he went after him. He walked over menacingly, his mechanical boots leaving noticeable imprints on the mud. As the father tried to crawl away, Sam flipped him over onto his back and grabbed him by the throat then lifted him into the air.

_ “You’re just as dumb as your son, you know that? Well, you know what they say, weakness breeds weakness.”  _ He reared his fist back to destroy his skull, but before he could, he heard someone yell at him.

“Sam!” He heard a familiar voice say. He looked to the road and saw multiple police cars along with Wilhelm in his gear. They all looked to be ready for a fight, but then again, so was Sam. “What the hell are you doing?” The old man asked. His voice didn’t sound angry, just disappointed.

_ “You haven’t been told?”  _ He said, bringing about shock in everyone there.  _ “I’m sick of staying silent.”  _ He lied.  _ “This subhuman was trying to avenge his murderer of a son by killing me.”  _ He turned his attention back to the still struggling man.  _ “So I figured I’d send him to join his kid.” _

“He should stand before justice, and that can’t happen if you take on judge, jury and executioner.” Wilhelm tried to talk Sam down from killing the man. “If you kill him, we won’t be able to let you stay here.” He warned.

  
_ “It doesn’t matter.”  _ His offhand came alive with crackling electricity.  _ “I wasn’t planning on staying here anyway.”  _ He grabbed the man’s face and began delivering powerful shocks directly to his head. He barely had the chance to scream in pain before his brain was totally fried, though his body continued twitching wildly as the energy coursed through him. After having his fill, and realizing the energy gauntlets were draining his fusion core far quicker then he’d thought they would, he dropped the charred corpse and walked back inside to gather his things. He was done running, and he had a feeling Mason was as well.


	15. Lupus

Astrea’s sight was clouded by blood and sweat as she endured yet another torture session, the Anti-Aura collar making her neck ache. While she didn’t need Aura to use her Maiden powers, it seemed radiation affected those the same way they did Aura. Since the primary interrogator of the Warborn, Gage, was off on a mission not known to her, members of the Iron Wolves had been tasked with getting her to cough up as much information as possible by any means necessary until he returned. And while she had managed to withstand their torture, she didn’t know how much more she could take.

The Wolves were very creative in what they did, and it didn’t help many of their members were former Disciples. They knew what they were doing, knew how much the human body could withstand before breaking apart. And they were doing everything short of dismemberment.

The room she was in was dark and damp, the walls and floor being a cold hard concrete that had long been stained with blood. The only source of light was a single candle on a nearby table, partially illuminating the room, but causing the various tools to gleam. She couldn’t see very well due to the blood in her eyes, but she could hear the heavy footsteps as her tormentor circled her and laughed.

“I gotta give you credit, you’re tougher than you look.” He pulled her head back by the hair and they got a good look at each other. He was a large bear Faunus, most likely a former member of the White Fang, and he grinned at her with sadism. He was only wearing jeans, an undershirt, and a pair of combat boots, though his helmet was hanging from his waist. He also had a pair of dog tags around his neck, something the Wolves had started doing semi-recently to further their military aesthetic.

“But sooner or later, you’ve gotta break.” He taunted as he picked up a drill and began to bring it to her hand bound to the armchair. Before he could do any further harm, the door opened and a Wolf in full uniform entered. By this point the blood had cleared from her eyes enough that she could see, and she was surprised to see who it was specifically. It was an Officer. While Officers still had the typical gas mask that’s common with all Wolves, instead of regular armor, they had an old Enclave officer uniform and hat, though repurposed to better fit the Wolves, along with an added leather trench coat. They had a powerful hand cannon holstered at their waist and had surprisingly tough body armor hidden beneath their uniforms.

The torturer set down his drill and stood at attention, his fist over his chest.

“At ease, soldier. General Lupus wants me to deliver this one to him.” The Faunus lowered his fist and grinned before getting to work undoing her bindings. Power Wolf had recently changed his name to Lupus to better fit his title. In her opinion, he was letting the power get to his head, though she wouldn’t be surprised if that had happened a while ago.

“Well well well, looks like the boss wants a word with you.” He chuckled as he lifted her out of the seat and dropped her to the floor. Then, two soldiers she hadn’t seen entered the room and lifted her by her arms before slapping her hands in cuffs and dragging her out of the room. Halfway down the hall they forced her to her feet and she struggled to walk. She looked at the cells around her, and she knew each one held an Aura-User of some sort. Cainen had recently outlawed Aura-Users in Mistral, at least those that wouldn’t work for him, and had bounties out for anyone who either brought in a User, or had information that would lead to the arrest of one. In a matter of days, the Warborn had turned what was once a free Kingdom into a military state. Though, from what she’d heard, it sounded like a few of the northern villages and towns were still holding out against them, though she didn’t know how long they’d hold out against them.

She was escorted out of the prison and into an armored van with the Wolves’ sigil on the side. She was thrown into the back where two other soldiers were waiting. The officer climbed in as well while the two escorts closed the door and hopped in the front. They started the beast of a vehicle and began the trip to the Black House, the renamed Academy. They drove in silence for a time before the officer spoke up.

“You know, you should feel honored. Not many people get to see the General these days, as he’s been very busy lately dealing with annoyances such as yourself.” He chuckled. She didn’t dignify him with a response, she simply looked at the metallic ground. After a while, the sound of tires on pavement changed to tires of gravel, until they eventually stopped.

“We’re here, sir.” One of the drivers informed them, his voice distorted by the mask. They exited and she was taken to the entrance of the massive factory. There were large smokestacks jutting out of the roof, but they were inactive as the factory was largely powered by a combination of nuclear energy and Dust. Before they entered, however, a blindfold was wrapped around her eyes, as the Wolves valued their industrial secrets. She was taken through the factory and could hear machinery operating all around her, though she couldn’t see what they were creating.

They entered through a door and she was roughly seated, where her blindfold was removed. She was sitting in a plain wooden chair, but the rest of the room was in sharp contrast. The walls were lined with various objects, ranging from valuable paintings to shelves holding equally valuable objects. Most were Power Armor helmets that had each been modified to an individual degree, and there were also various legendary weapons from the Commonwealth that she knew about. She recognized Les Fusil Terribles, the signature shotgun of Gabriel, leader of the Libertalia Raiders, as well as a few others, but most of them were unknown to her.

To her left, there was a fairly large liquor cabinet filled with an assortment of drinks both from the Commonwealth and Remnant. And then there was the main man’s desk. It was mostly blank aside from his computer and a bust of a man she didn’t recognize, though the sigil of the Enclave at the base along with the initials “A.A.” told her he was a member of the infamous organization. But what really struck her was the mounted head of a Grimmified Deathclaw above his seat. Well, a realistic carving of one, anyway. Its skin was black as obsidian and its eyes glowed red with malevolence. It had bone armor plating covering almost the entirety of its head, giving the illusion of a helmet. Instead of two horns, it had four, two that were shaped like the regular horns, and two more that were curved more downward. Perfect for goring. And instead of the roaring pose mounted Deathclaw heads were normally put in, this one sported a stoic expression that made her feel like it was judging her soul. Though, from what she’d heard, that’s how real Grimmified Deathclaws were like.

General Lupus was sat at his desk, wearing his usual gas mask and armored coat, his long black hair going past his shoulders. He eyed them for a moment before gesturing to the escorts, his hands bound in fingerless gloves. They saluted him and left, leaving them all alone.

“I hope my men have adhered to the “No Dismemberment” rule we’ve applied to you.” He leaned back in his chair. “They can get rather violent when they feel like it.” She didn’t respond, only glaring at him. He sighed and stood.

“I can understand your hatred for us, but I haven't brought you here to further your interrogation.” He walked over to his liquor cabinet and retrieved a bottle labeled “Bobrov’s Best” along with a pair of whiskey glasses.

“It truly is a wonder that your desperate attempt to escape has caused all this chaos, all this expansion, all this pain.” He said as he set down the glasses on his desk. He opened the bottle and poured some of the golden liquid in each of the glasses before setting it down. He picked up both glasses, approached her and offered her a drink

“It’ll make you feel better.” He offered. She eventually gave him, snatching it out of his hand, but waiting for him to drink first. He sat back down and, upon seeing that she still hadn’t taken a sip, laughed lightly.

“If I had wanted you dead, you would still be in your cell.” He lifted his mask just enough for him to take a sip before lowering it. She was able to see some black stubble and what looked like a scar, but that was it.

“Why did you bring me here?” She finally spoke, her voice full of hate. Now that she at least partially knew what that Branwen woman must’ve gone through while she was captured here, she had a newfound disgust for the Raiders.

“You know what your fate is here. To be tortured for as much information as possible about your companions before Gage returns to finish the job.” He took another sip. “But from there, you will be given to Dr. Fuar to conduct whatever experiments he wishes on you. I’m sure he would love to have a Maiden to do whatever he pleases with, as the scientific discoveries would undoubtedly be astounding.”

“Where are you going with this?” She said, cutting to the chase. He leaned forward and steepled his fingers.

“I’m here to make you an offer.” He began. “You will still have your memories rummaged through by our resident mind reader, that is inevitable. Afterwards, however, I give you a choice.” He stood up and paced around to her. “You can either be gifted to Dr. Fuar like I said earlier,” He stopped in front of her. “or you can agree to work for me as an Iron Wolf Commander. You would be given control over a group of elite and highly trained soldiers, your role being to crush any semblance of rebellion in Mistral.” He held his hand out. “So? Do you accept?” She looked at his hand.

“Does your boss know about this?” Her voice still held hatred, but it had been lessened somewhat.

“No, as he is currently away on business with some potential allies. But I’m sure he will approve when I inform him.” He answered truthfully. She thought for a moment before slapping his hand away.

“You really think I’d work with Raiders? Go to Hell, it’s where you belong.” She snarled. He shrugged before turning around to go back to his desk. Taking this opportunity, she smashed the glass on her chair and quickly went to stab him in the neck while he wasn’t looking. Unfortunately, his reaction time was far better than she expected, as he caught her arm before punching her in the face, shattering her nose and sending her to the carpeted floor.

“Tsk tsk tsk.” He scolded as he kneeled over her. “I really expected more of you.” Right then two guards came in and put a bag over her head, not even bothering with the blindfold, and dragged her out of the office. General Lupus looked down at the mess of spilled alcohol and broken glass that now stained his carpet.

“Great, now I’ll need to get someone to clean this up.”

**X**

Mason and Sam walked down a road by themselves, three miles from Vita now. They had been exiled for what Sam did, but neither of them had been the least bit upset about it. What they were upset about, however, was the fact that they now had a bounty on their heads. Turns out someone, they assumed a friend of Eugene’s family because they didn’t actually know, was fairly rich and didn’t like what they did. Now they had a bounty of 1,000 Lien for each of them, with a 500 bonus for bringing them in alive. Luckily, nobody knew where they were, so they were safe for now.

“So, where do we go now?” Mason asked. They had to have a gameplan, or at least a place where they could safely make one.

_ “As much as I’d like to go to Mistral and kill that son of a bitch, Cainen, we’re not nearly prepared enough for that.”  _ Sam thought aloud.  _ “You know of any good places we could hide out while we figure shit out?”  _ Mason thought for a moment before remembering something he’d seen in the news before they’d been chased away from Vale.

“You ever heard of Mt. Glenn?” He asked, to which Sam shook his head. “It was Vale’s first and last attempt at expanding. It was a small city built into the mountain that was overrun by Grimm. I figure since it’s built on a mountain, it’s gotta have some sort of underground bunker we could hide out in.” Sam nodded at that.

_ “Good idea. I’m assuming you know where it is?”  _ Mason nodded and pulled out his Scroll.

“It’s a couple miles directly north of here. If we can reach it before nightfall, we’ll be set.”

_ “What if you just hop on my back and I sprint the whole way there? It’d be a helluva lot faster than just walking.”  _ Mason furrowed his brow at that.

“You sure that’s a good idea? We don't have many fusion cores left, and I need to figure out an alternative solution to that.”

_ “We’ll lose a lot more power just by walking. At least my way it’ll be faster.”  _ After some hesitation, Mason relented.

“Alright, let me climb on.” Mason pulled out and wore a pair of blacked out welding goggles and a bandana to protect his face from any branches before hopping on Sam’s back and sprinting full speed into the forest, straight towards the mountain.

_ “Hey, I’m just curious, but do the kids at Beacon ever take field trips up here or something?”  _ Sam had to shout a bit due to how much noise he was making.

“Oh I’m sure they do, but I have no idea how often those trips would be, nor how long they are.” Mason shouted back, eliciting a chuckle from Sam.

_ “How fucked would it be if we ran into one?” _

“Hey, don’t tempt fate buddy.”

_ “Yeah whatever.” _

They remained in silence for a while afterwards until the entrance to the city came into view. The once proud metal gate had long been torn to shreds by something they’d rather not meet in person, and the place was likely to have quite a few Grimm residing within. Hence the need to find the underground bunker. They slowed to a stop and Mason hopped off Sam’s back while moving his face coverings.

“How’s your core?” Mason asked while unzipping his bag.

_ “It’s at 20%, so we should be ok for a couple more hours.”  _ Sam got his rifle out and checked to make sure the cartridge was fully charged before slapping it back in.  _ “You got anything you can use to defend yourself?”  _ He asked while moving towards the gate. He was answered by the sound of a shotgun rack being pumped and he turned around to see Mason holding one, his face coverings back up.

“Yeah, I got this.” He said as he held the firearm.

_ “How long have you had that? I’ve never seen it before.” _

“A while actually, I’ve just never really had to use it. Now, let’s go and find that bunker.” Sam shrugged and they both made their way into the abandoned city. When they finally made it to the city proper, Mason was surprised to see that it looked very similar to the city from the Commonwealth, if just styled differently. There were large concrete buildings slowly crumbling over time and being overtaken by vines and other forms of nature.

_ “Shit, maybe we could just find a spot high up and stay there.”  _ Sam suggested, to which Mason shook his head.

“No, Nevermores wouldn’t be our only problems up there. Getting up and down to get supplies while also trying to make sure the building is stable would be too much trouble.” They continued for a while, only ever coming across a single Beowolf, which was quickly dispatched by Sam. While the lack of Grimm should’ve been reassuring to them, it only put them on edge. It meant there was something else here driving them away, and they had to keep an eye out for whatever or whoever it was.

After a few hours, night was beginning to fall. Mason swapped out Sam’s old core for a fresh one and they entered an old building for shelter where Mason could sleep for the night. It was an old mechanic’s shop that reminded him a lot of a Red Rocket. Even had the same general layout. He’d stayed in one for a few nights after escaping the Institute before he’d found that military bunker. Before he’d run into Astrea. Mason shook his head of those thoughts as they checked the building for Grimm. Luckily, there were only some rats that scurried away at the sight of them. They set up shop in the back office and Mason started gathering fuel for a fire. Unfortunately, since Astrea wasn’t here, he had to get the fire going by himself with an old lighter he’d found in the trash. He was surprised it still had fuel in it.

As he laid down to sleep and Sam went on patrol, he was greeted by nightmares of being captured by the Warborn, before being abused in ways he’d never wish on anyone. His sleep was fitful, and he would undoubtedly be tired come morning.


	16. Alliance

Mason awoke to a loud crash coming from a nearby street. He jumped to his feet, grabbing his shotgun on the way up, and ran out to the front of the shop. It was still the dead of night, the moon hanging high in the sky was evidence enough of that, but now he had to figure out where that crash came from. It sounded like it could’ve been rubble dislodging from something, but he had to be sure. Right then, Sam came around from the back of the building.

_ “The fuck was that?!”  _ He said, just as confused as he was.

“I dunno, but we gotta check it out.” Sam nodded and they headed off in the direction of the sound. They didn’t have to travel far, as they found a large hole just down the street from their temporary hideout.

“Well, that explains why it was so loud. Can you see what’s down there?” The hole was pitch black and could’ve been caused by anything. Sam knelt down next to the hole, cautious in case that part he was on collapsed, and looked in. He activated his night vision, I reeled back slightly in surprise.

_ “I can see people down there, what the hell?”  _ He leaned in closer for a better look, and he growled.  _ “There’re White Fang down there. And it looks like they’re dragging away someone, maybe the person who made the hole. She looks unconscious, and she’s dressed like a Huntress.” _

Mason sighed. “You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me. Well, how the hell are we getting down there? It’s not like we can just jump.” He looked at the hole for a minute when he realized Sam hadn’t responded. He looked up at him and saw he was just staring at him. Then he realized why.

“No, don’t even fucking think about it.” He said sternly.

_ “See you in a bit, buddy.”  _ He shrugged before jumping into the hole, the loud boom of him hitting the ground resonating through the large underground chamber.

“Well fuck you too.” He grumbled to himself. He put on his bandana and goggles before looking around, shotgun in both hands. “Guess I’m finding another way down.” He sighed before running off to do just that.

Sam hit the ground hard, landing on an unfortunate White Fang grunt and turning him into red paste. Before they could even speak, he raised his plasma rifle and opened fire with programmed precision. Each shot hit its target, reducing anyone caught in his crosshairs to green sludge before they could even draw their weapons.

One came up behind him and tried to kill him with a blade strike to the back, only to have a metal hand swing around and smash his skull in. He returned his attention to the terrorists in front of him and realized they were now all either dead or retreating back to the main base, which he could see in the distance. He could see a large train station up ahead, an equally large train being loaded with unknown cargo. He picked up the young Huntress, who he realized looked more like a Huntress-In-Training, along with her weapon and ran behind a building as he heard enemy reinforcements incoming.

As they did, she began to stir and moan in pain.

“W-wha-?” She slurred out. The landing must’ve hit her pretty hard, which was strange since she would've had Aura. Maybe it had been previously weakened by something, he didn’t know.

_ “Hey, you awake enough yet?”  _ He said as he peeked out behind the corner, only to have a bullet ping off his helmet harmlessly. They were here.

“What? Who’re you?” She said as she began to regain full consciousness. And when she did, she immediately went wide eyed. “The White Fang are down here!” She shouted as she got her weapon ready.

_ “Yeah yeah, I know!”  _ The terrorists had started shooting at them, with Sam returning fire.  _ “Get your ass in gear and help me take these bastards out!” _

“Right.” She unfolded her weapon into a massive scythe, but Sam was too distracted to really be shocked. She jumped out of cover and dashed towards her opponents, leaving behind rose petals. He figured it was just her Semblance and continued fighting. Since she was distracting the terrorists pretty well, he got out of cover and started picking off anyone outside of her attack range. He was also pretty impressed with the fact the handle of the scythe doubled as a gun, as she used it to prepell her scythe faster. He just hoped he didn’t get hit by a stray bullet.

He shot down a sniper in the middle of climbing a ladder, the plasma burning through his back and melting his heart. Another jumped out of a building, but he was swiftly ended as well. His programming allowed him to fight like a trained verteran of war, and he mentally thanked Mason for his computer skills. After a while, the White Fang began retreating from the young Huntress and her hulking companion back to the train. As they did, he approached the girl.

_ “What’s your name? I’m Sam.”  _ He quickly introduced himself.

“Ruby Rose.” She said with a wide smile. “So, should we-?” She stopped when she looked behind him to see how many guys he’d knocked out. Only to realize they weren’t unconscious. Her face paled as she saw multiple bodies, all with holes burned in them, smoke still wafting from them. And that didn’t even count the puddles of green goo that used to be people. Their attention was caught when the train’s horn blared and White Fang began boarding.

_ “Shit, we gotta go. C’mon.”  _ He reloaded his rifle and took off, his heavy foot falls pounding the ground. She hesitated for a moment, distracted by the death he left behind, but ultimately decided to confront him about it later. They caught up to the train just in time to see it start to leave, the doors having been shut. As he tried to figure out a way to stop the train, a grenade went sailing over them, and landed next to the train.

“Get the fuck out of the way!” He heard someone behind them shout. He turned and saw Mason sprinting towards them with his shotgun in one hand and wearing a combination of light combat armor and leather armor. They both got to cover inside a cleared out building, and waited. Turns out the grenade was an EMP grenade, meant to disable the engine. What Mason wasn’t expecting, however, was for the large amount of electricity to go right through the train, due to its lack of electrical protection, and trigger the Dust fueling it. That resulted in the entire front of the train, including the conductor’s cockpit, exploding from the Dust. The train was now completely incapable of moving.

The doors opened and the White Fang were immediately met by sniper rounds, buckshot and plasma from the trio.

“Shit man, wasn’t expecting that to happen!” Mason said as he blasted a terrorist that had gotten too close. Soon after, a group of Huntresses, and one Huntsman, appeared and began helping them.

_ “You know them?!”  _ Sam asked as he continued putting down hostiles left and right.

“That’s the rest of my team, along with Professor Oobleck.” She said with relief. Mason couldn’t be sure, but he could’ve sworn he heard someone angrily shout “Doctor!” from the fight. Nodding at each other, Mason and Sam vaulted over the cover to join the fight more personally. Mason managed to sneak up on one of them before smashing the butt of his shotgun over the back of his head, knocking him over. He then planted his foot on their back before blowing his head off with a trigger pull. Sam charged forward and knocked over multiple soldiers with his shoulder, trampling a few and leaving the others with broken bones. He eventually stopped when he pushed through to the other side before turning around and opening fire on any terrorists he saw.

The fight continued with the White Fang slowly dwindling in number until everyone was either unconscious, in the case of those the Huntresses fought, or dead, in the case of the ones Mason and Sam fought. Sam finished the fight when he curb stomped a terrorists head into a stain on the ground before taking a moment to refocus himself. Then he turned around and saw the carnage. While the ones the Huntresses had fought were relatively ok, the same couldn’t be said for those the two wastelanders had killed. While Mason’s kills had been relatively clean, strange considering he was wielding a shotgun, Sam’s had been messy.

Melted and broken bodies were strewn across the battlefield, caused by either his plasma rifle or his mechanical fists. While Mason was distracted by reloading his weapon and checking himself for any unnoticed injuries, Sam realized the girls were coming to the realization of what they’d done.

“Wait, you-?” The blonde one started in a shaky voice as she looked at the death around her, but couldn’t finish as she gagged.

“Gods, you killed them.” The black haired one said in shock, though she seemed more impacted by the death than her comrades. The white haired one and Ruby were stunned into silence, and they were all distracted by the sound of Yang emptying her bowels. Sam realized they had to get out of there. If this Professor Oobleck was a teacher, he wouldn’t hesitate to capture them and hand them over to the authorities for this, especially if he knew about their bounties.

Him and Mason looked at each other, nodded in understanding, but before they could run, said professor turned his attention to them. He was surprisingly calm, but that only further unnerved them.

“Who are you two?” He asked them, leaving no room for argument.

“We’re just a pair of travellers sir. We heard the fighting and figured we’d help.” Mason lied, but Oobleck saw right through it.

“I’d believe it if it was just you, but the combat prowess your friend showed says otherwise. I’m afraid you’ll both have to come with me back to the city.” Sam picked up a small click from his staff, and figured he probably just activated its gun mode. That didn’t mean anything good.

_ “We can’t do that. We’re distracted enough as it is from this little fight, and we need to continue our journey.”  _ Sam knew there was no getting out of this situation peacefully, but he was trying to stall for time in case Mason had something up his sleeve.  _ “Look, we saved your student who was being dragged away by these terrorist fucks. We’ve shown not to have any hostile intent, so just let us go peacefully.”  _ Oobleck shook his head, cementing his stance on this.

“You helping us isn’t the problem. You are two completely unknown and heavily armed people who were wandering around a Grimm infested city. Not only that, but you killed these White Fang in cold blood. Terrorists or not, that doesn’t give you the right to butcher them and quite possibly traumatise my students.” He pointed his staff at them, which he now realized was a flamethrower, and scowled slightly. Peace was out the window. “That cannot go unpunished.” After a moment of silence, Mason sighed for seemingly the 100th time tonight.

“Sorry about this.” He then quickly revealed he’d been holding a pistol behind his back and fired at him without fully aiming. He hit the man in the gut, revealing it to be loaded with Anti-Aura rounds, causing him to fall to his knees in pain. Mason and Sam immediately began sprinting in the opposite direction, Mason hopping on his back so they could go at full speed.

_ “You shot him in the fucking stomach?!”  _ Sam yelled angrily, as this would only make them criminals now, especially if the wound proved to be fatal.

“I was aiming for the knee!” Mason defended himself.

_ “With the speed that you drew that thing, I’m surprised you aimed at all!” _

“Just keep running! Some of the Huntresses are after us, I’ll focus on dealing with them!” He pointed to an open stairwell not far from the hole he’d originally fallen through. “Those are the stairs I used to get down here! Go for them!” Sam changed course as Mason aimed his pistol at the two Huntresses chasing them. They were the white and black haired ones, and while they weren’t as fast as Sam, their use of their Semblances and weapons respectively allowed them to begin slowly gaining on them.

Mason let loose a shot which hit one of the black haired girl’s weapons, knocking it out of her hand and forcing her to stop to retrieve it.

“Shit, I got better aim than I thought.” He commented to himself. He shot at the white haired one, but he missed as Sam sidestepped a glyph summoned by her and knocked his aim off balance. By this point black hair had joined the chase, but was much farther behind. Mason started letting off wild shots as he all but gave up on aiming due to the glyphs Sam was being forced to dodge. Eventually the gun clicked as it was emptied.

“Fuck.” He cursed under his breath. He put the pistol back in his bag and fished around for something else. He didn’t care what he grabbed. They were so close to the stairs that anything could help. His hand wrapped around something grenade shaped and he pulled it out. Not looking at whatever it was, he pulled the pin and threw it. It detonated, and he realized what it’d been. It’d been a Nuka Grenade, the only one in his stock.

His goggles prevented him from being blinded by the blast, but he couldn’t say the same for their pursuers. The grenade, due to the detonation delay, exploded directly in range of the balck haired girl. That caused the white one to stop and look between them and the direction of the explosion, debating whether or not to continue chasing them, or go check on her friend. Then a scream emanated from the smoke, and she made her decision, letting them get away.

_ “What the hell was that?!”  _ Sam yelled at him again.

“A big fuckup, that’s what!” Mason was almost panicking by this point. As if him shooting a Huntsman was bad enough, now he had to deal with the ramifications of possibly killing a young Huntress-In-Training. As Sam ascended the stairs at breakneck speed, Mason knew this’d come back to bite him in the ass at some point. He just didn’t know when.

**X-X**

The group of men sat in the dilapidated meeting room in silence, waiting with nervousness for their potential business partner to arrive. Right as one of them was about to call him, the doors opened, and they were met with the smell of smoke. He had arrived.

The Vacuan crime lords looked to the door and saw the reason for this meeting. The leader of the Warborn, Cainen, had wanted to meet with them in person, as he had more business here than just cementing an alliance with Vacuo. The large warmonger sat down at the head of the table and gazed over them in brief silence, looking them over. None of them were pushovers, and they had guards just outside the door should things go south, but they were still nervous around him. He had bested and imprisoned Raven Branwen, leader of the old Branwen Tribe, so he was not a man to be underestimated.

“I assume you all know why we’re here?” He questioned, and he was met by a round of nods and verbal agreements. “Good, then let’s get started.” He pulled out a briefcase that they hadn’t noticed him carrying and opened it. He pulled out a stack of papers and rested them on the table before putting away the case. He picked one up, carefully, so as not to damage them with his clawed gauntlets, and looked it over.

“If you all agree to finalize your alliance with Oblivion and the Warborn, I will be opening trade with the crime families of Vacuo, allowing you to purchase weapons and supplies from us, including Anti-Aura weaponry.” The bosses were now less on edge, but still wary of him as they agreed to these terms. “However, these weapons are not to be distributed to anyone outside of the families they are sold to without my express permission. These weapons are, obviously, extremely valuable and dangerous, and I don’t want every asshole with an ego on Remnant getting his hands on one. I would also prefer you only either keep them for yourselves, or give one to an underboss of your choice. Giving them to your foot men will only increase the risk of them being stolen. Am I clear?” They, once again, agreed. He didn’t know if they were naturally this agreeable or if his presence was making them so, but this meeting was going surprisingly well. It looked like he wouldn’t be needing to make a show of force.

He set aside the previous paper and picked up the second one of three. “Should I deem it necessary, I may occasionally send some of my men over to perform a task I may not deem you competent enough to perform.” That caused a few of them to bristle slightly, but they remained silent. “Depending on the situation, I will be giving them certain privileges while they are here, such as the ability to search warehouses under a family’s control, increased access to munitions, and other such things. Preventing them from exercising these privileges will be met with severe punishment. Is this understood?” This time, someone spoke up.

“Why would you send anyone here? We clearly have this place fully under our thumb.” He laughed. He was clearly the youngest of the bosses, and the most boastful. Cainen didn’t like that.

“Because I don’t trust you to not try and backstab me. I’ve been in this position for quite a long time, longer than you may think. And questioning my decision is not a good idea.” This got the boss to shut up. He would have to keep a closer eye on him in the future, in case he got any wild ideas.

“Now,” He started as he grabbed the last of the papers. “should any of your men capture an Aura-User, regardless of who they are or the circumstances they are to be shipped off to Oblivion and brought under my authority.” Now this caused some controversy, as multiple bosses made their opposition known.

“That’ll bring way too much attention to us! We can’t do that!”

“Why the hell do you want Aura-Users, anyway?”

“Some of those people might as well be children, we aren’t doing that!”

“Enough!” Cainen shouted, his Semblance intensifying as he slammed the table. Everyone sat down and shut up, fearing he’d unleash his Flames of War. He stood up and began slowly circling the table.

“My reasoning is my own, and none of you need to know why I need them. You will likely know soon enough anyway, so simply accept my terms or pay the price of insubordination. You will be given access to some of the greatest weaponry Remnant has ever seen, so these conditions should be trivial to you.”

“We don’t need to take this shit from you. You’re in our home, you are our guest. Don’t piss us off.” One of the older bosses said, his voice full of ego. Cainen continued circling around until he came behind him, when he stopped. He placed his left hand on his shoulder, the heat making the man uncomfortable.

“You were so close to prosperity.” He said before his right hand raked across his throat, tearing it open. He fell out of his seat, gurgling blood before Cainen curb stomped his head repeatedly, making sickening wet noises as his head was crushed. The man lay there, very dead, and Cainen walked back to his seat, leaving behind bloody boot prints.

“Anyone else want to try and threaten me?” Everybody shook their heads, and he chuckled.

“Good. Now, get someone in here to clean this mess up. And find a replacement for him.” He rose, leaving his briefcase, and left the room. What he didn’t tell them, for now anyway, was that he’d be staying here until he could gain access to Shade Academy, where the Relic of Destruction and the spirit inhabiting it resided, while Lupus would rule in his stead. Even from here, he could hear the whispering call of Exitium, beckoning him to bring destruction to Remnant.

And now Oblivion and Vacuo were officially allies, and Cainen would make sure to take full advantage of that. He couldn’t wait until he could return to his throne and see Astrea personally.


	17. Creator Burned

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for how long this took, my old laptop shit itself and died. Didn't lose anything, but it was damn annoying.

A few days after his meeting with the crime heads, Cainen sat at the desk of his Vacuan office, scrolling through the reports on his Scroll Lupus had sent him. The office, when he’d first arrived at the abandoned building it laid in, had been bland and far too formal, but after some classic Raider redecorating, he finally felt somewhat at home. He’d strung up some Warborn flags and along with a few dead bodies he’d “procured” from the local homeless population. Not like anybody would miss those guys. The office was situated at the top of the building, away from the other mobsters using the place. He always did like his privacy.

Aside from the occasional captured Aura-User, nothing in the reports spoke of anything interesting happening back in Oblivion. On the topic of the Synth Maiden, Dr. Fuar had wanted to run some tests on her that Cainen didn’t really care about. Something about “testing her limits.” After confirming none of them would be lethal, he gave him the go ahead. It would put her to some use while he figured out a way to get to the relic. He wouldn’t be able to launch a full scale invasion like he had with Haven. No, this required a more delicate touch, as much as he hated it.

There were multiple ways he could get into Shade, but not one of them would be easy in any way. He could try to infiltrate the Academy by posing as faculty, but the passive effect his Semblance gave off would be a dead giveaway. Another option, and one that had been proposed by Gage, would be to smuggle him in somehow. It sounded like it could work, but he still had to figure out how, along with other details. Another issue was that he didn’t know where the entrance to the relic was, and he didn’t like the idea of searching for it himself while trying not to get caught. Two ways he could get that info was by either forcing it out of the Headmaster, Theodore, or by paying off an employee there to search for it, then telling them the location.

He was brought out of his thoughts by knocking on his office door. Growling in annoyance he barked for whoever it was to come in. The door opened and he was surprised to see one of the crime bosses, Cross, he remembered his name was, enter his room. He was unique from the other bosses in that he rarely used his Semblance, primarily relying on his immense combat skill. It had gotten to the point that there wasn’t a man alive that could tell you what his Semblance actually was. He was an average sized man, and wore a simple gray sweater and sweatpants, along with a pair of leather gloves. But on his face he wore a sinister looking mask. It looked like a cyberized scarecrow mask, with the main part being black with a glowing red menacing stitched grin and eyes. Along with the mask he had some sort of balaclava on, making it so there wasn’t an inch of exposed skin on his body.

“Hey boss.” He said, his raspy voice slightly muffled by the mask. “I got something for you.”

“Alright, out with it.” Cainen ordered, not really giving him his full attention. Cross looked around briefly before shaking his head.

“No, the walls are thin here. I got a better place in mind.” This got Cainen’s attention, though not for many good reasons.

“I don’t have the patience for this shit, Cross.” He said as he stood up, glaring at the masked mobster.

“Just trust me on this boss. It’ll be good, I promise.” He then left the room, beckoning for him to follow. Cainen grumbled, but figured there was no harm in it. He didn’t have anything important to do, and he was now curious as to where this was going. And if he tried anything, he was confident he’d be able to overpower him, even if he used this mystery Semblance of his.

He quickly donned his now infamous gauntlets, slipped a knife into his boot just for extra security, then followed after Cross.

_ This better be good. _

**X**

Mason and Sam walked through the dense woods of the Emerald Forest, not speaking to each other. They had been avoiding the roads, since those were the places most commonly being searched by Huntsman parties for them, and they hadn’t spoken since escaping Mountain Glenn. Mason couldn’t help but feel awful for what he’d done. He hadn’t meant to potentially kill a teacher and one of his students, he just panicked. And now there was no hope of ever getting any support from the Valean Council.

On the other hand, Sam didn’t seem to feel anything at all. Then again, it was difficult to read the emotions of a robot, even if he had a personality core. After what felt like hours of walking, an audible series of beeps made their way from Sam, indicating his Fusion Core was running low.

_ “Mason, I need a fresh core.”  _ Sam said. Mason wordlessly tossed him a Dust Core, fire to be specific, before continuing walking. Sam looked it over, confused as to why he hadn't given him a Fusion Core.

_ “We run out of Fusions or something?”  _ He asked, looking up from the red colored Core. Mason only shrugged, not bothering to turn around. Sam grumbled before taking out the old Core and plugging in the new one. As soon as he inserted it, he felt a rush of fire throughout his system, like he’d just taken a small hit of Psycho. How he knew what that felt like was beyond him. Shaking off the feeling of raw power, he caught up to Mason, intent on figuring out what was wrong. He didn’t want to have to drag along a mopy human if he could help it.

He got up to him and grabbed his shoulder, spinning him around.

_ “What the hell’s the matter with you? You depressed or something?”  _ He asked very bluntly. He didn’t have the patience to deal with this. The only thing on his mind was finding a way to rescue Astrea.

“No, it’s just that I feel bad for possibly killing some of the Hunters back there.” Mason said solemnly, and Sam became confused.

_ “Why? It was us or them, they would’ve arrested us.”  _ He said, and Mason donned a look of disbelief, and that’s when Sam realized he’d opened a can of worms.

“What the fuck are you talking about? They were just kids, and they were only doing their jobs, do you not regret it?” Mason soon regretted asking as Sam scoffed.

_ “They were out to get us, the only thing I regret is leaving witnesses to identify us. Now come on, we’re losing daylight.”  _ Sam went on ahead for a few meters, but stopped when he didn’t hear Mason’s footsteps behind him. He turned around and saw Mason simply standing there, a look of horror and disgust on his face.

“What did you say?” He said, quietly.

_ “No, don’t start this shit. Like I said, it was us or them, and don’t even try and think otherwise.”  _ He took a step forward, causing the other man to take a step back.

“You would kill literal children without a second thought? You’re a fucking monster.” Mason started eyeing a nearby thicket and Sam immediately knew what he was thinking.

Mason now realized what was wrong. He didn’t know what, but something was corrupting Sam’s personality core. He’d programmed him to be kind and have honorable virtues, not be a ruthless killing machine hell bent on completing whatever task he’d set for himself. He knew there was a particularly dense set of woods close by, and if he could escape to the nearest town, he could turn himself in and warn them of what was happening to Sam.

As Mason made a break for it, Sam started to chase after him. He wouldn’t really care normally, but Mason had all their supplies, most importantly the Cores he needed to function. He quickly caught up to him and went to grab him, but as he did so, Mason showed a surprising amount of agility as he ducked under his swing and continued running.

_ “Dammit, stop running! You know I’ll catch up to you eventually, don’t make me use my rifle!”  _ He yelled, but Mason didn’t heed his warning. Mason jumped over a fallen log while Sam simply smashed through it, neither losing much speed. Mason could hear his mechanical stomps getting closer and closer, and he hadn’t felt this kind of fear since his escape from the Institute.

He then heard Sam stop and thought he’d given up, before he heard a soft sound and a plasma round went into his shoulder, causing him to lose his balance and fall. Sam was quickly upon him, planting his foot on his back, pinning him to the forest floor. He yelled for him to let him go, but didn’t receive the response he was looking for.

_ “You’re a lost cause, old friend.”  _ He said, his voice solemn. Then he felt the cold barrel of his plasma rifle press against the back of his head.  _ “It didn’t have to be like this, but I can’t risk you bringing me down with you.”  _ With those final words he pulled the trigger, and gave his creator a quick and painless death. And lifted his foot from Mason’s still form, his head now nothing more than green goo. He picked up the bag from his corpse and searched, glad to see one of the equipment or supplies had been damaged in the scuffle. But his primary concern was whether or not he’d be able to make any more Dust Cores without Mason.

Luckily, there was a hidden pouch in the main pocket of the bag, and within it were various blueprints. Most of them were for equipment Mason had already made, but two caught his eye. The first was for Dust Cores utilizing various forms of Dust, Ice Cores, Fire Cores, even Gravity Cores. But the one that caught his eye was the second one. It was for a large, Dust fueled Battleax that, according to the note attached, was meant to be forged as a gift for Sam when Mason was next able to build it.

_ “Now, what to do now?”  _ He said to himself, but whipped round with his rifle raised as he heard someone approach. He then began to hear slow clapping, but it didn’t sound natural, it was like someone was slapping metal instead of flesh. As they revealed themselves, Sam was shocked by who he saw.

“Took you long enough to get sick of him.” Said none other than Raven Branwen, an eyepatch over one of her eyes, her right arm replaced with a cybernetic replacement, and a simple metal katana strapped on her side. Things were about to get interesting.

**X**

The quiet thief slunk through the Warborn outpost. This one was operated by the Iron Wolves, so he had to be more careful than normal. He had managed to get past the outer defenses by using a limited range EMP to knock out the mechanical defenses, then slipping past before they reactivated. As he snuck through empty alleys under the cover of the night towards the former police station now base of operations, he reminisced about the days before the Warborn took over Mistral. They had come out of nowhere, and now they owned everything. And it seemed like none of the other Kingdoms could do anything about it. Or wouldn’t, in the case of Vale and Vacuo.

He slowly began to reach the main building, but had to stop when an ATV rolled past. The main problem with the Iron Wolves was their militarism, which made them difficult to sneak past. They were more like a military sect than a raider gang. As he made it to the building, he snuck around back to see if there were any entry points. As he did, he found an unlocked window leading to the cafeteria. Unfortunately, there were four Wolves inside, sitting at a table by themselves and talking about something. They were still in their gear, but one strange thing was their visors were red instead of green and they didn’t have any Iron Wolf symbols on their shoulder pads.

_ These guys might be a special group, maybe I can learn something from them.  _ He thought, so he silently cracked the window open just enough for him to hear their conversation.

“It’s definitely more of a romantic restaurant than a family-” The first man started but was interrupted when the second man slammed his fist into the table.

“It’s a fucking pot of cheese!” He yelled. This caused the third man to begin laughing hysterically while the first two argued, but above them he could hear the fourth man yelling.

“Ain’t no bitch out there that I’m taking to the Melting Pot!” The second and fourth man quieted down enough for the first to defend himself.

“It’s not just cheese, there’s a main course of various exotic meats!”

“What do I do with the meat!?” The fourth man yelled before the thief closed the window, convinced he wasn’t going to get anything out of that exchange. Unfortunately as he turned around, he realized there was someone standing there, dressed in the same armor as the group from the cafeteria.

“And what the hell are you doing here?” He said, a hint of humor in his voice. He didn’t take him seriously at all. Realizing he was caught, he snarled before answering.

“My name is Gabriel, and I fight for the Resistance!” He yelled, but he hadn’t even drawn his knife halfway before the soldier unholstered his sidearm and blew his brains out. His specialist training really came in handy.


End file.
